Yes yes... Equal and equaler...

Bagheera wrote:Not all opinions are valid; some are just wrong.

In order to justify this as more than just "Bags knows best, so shut up" you'd need to demonstrate evidence from the films that is unambiguously at odds with the interpretation presented. Damn near everything is vague and fanwanked all to hell at this point though, so it's pretty much a pointless endeavor.

It is, however, also equally pointless to argue in favor of it. If I had my way we'd just shut the whole rebuild forum down until final comes out because 99% of this is just wild-ass speculation.

NemZ wrote:In order to justify this as more than just "Bags knows best, so shut up" you'd need to demonstrate evidence from the films that is unambiguously at odds with the interpretation presented.

That's been done! Here's the go to, crystal clear example: Stillborn likes to say Final will end in misery, just like all of Anno's other work. Only problem? None of Anno's other work ends like that. Not a single one. EoE's about as dark as he gets, and that's directly contradicted by EoTV. So how does it make any sort of sense to suggest that making things dark and dreary is somehow Anno's default style?

It's easy enough to take all of his other stock claims and refute them in the same fashion. They're not matters of interpretation, man; they're just wrong.

Bagheera wrote:Only problem? None of Anno's other work ends like that. Not a single one.

weeeeeeeeellllllll.........there is one work he made that ended on a downer, that being his God Warrior short

Arcadia's legacy wrote:weeeeeeeeellllllll.........there is one work he made that ended on a downer, that being his God Warrior short

To be fair, while that was directed by him, Miyazaki also collaborated on that, and it KIND OF (maybe a bit of a stretch) serves as a prequel to Nausicaa, so the story doesn't just end with the destruction of humanity as a downer ending, we at least KNOW the story doesn't end there.

I'll agree Anno's collected body of work (such that I've seen, anyway) doesn't unambiguously support that conclusion, but I also think each work stands or falls on it's own so it doesn't really matter what he's done in the past.

But they do give us good insight into his approach in storytelling, and thus seeing virtually all his works end with some form of positivity, it's fair to assume Final will as well

Doesn't matter. Past performance is not a guarantee of future results.

NemZ wrote:Doesn't matter. Past performance is not a guarantee of future results.

Which ironically would be a great rebuttal if what Stillborn often claims was actually true. But it isn't, so his doggedly pessimistic reasoning is doubly flawed.

Stillborn wrote:And personally, that's what I'm expecting to happen with Shinji in last movie. Constant lowering of expectations, and not only that but he would be chastised for setting them too high in the first place. I'm not looking forward to this, but that's what I'm expecting.

So, what have to happen in 3.0+1.0, that would make you think, that your expectations were wrong?

Gendo'sPapa wrote:It's a solid argument with validity behind it that comes from a genuine emotional place BUT Shinji's actions were not done with knowing malicious intent.

Obviously, but they're talking about what it looked/felt like from Misato's & Asuka's perspective and what's realistic as far as that is concerned. Just because he's just as confused &horrified as everyone else doesn't meant they see him that way, or that we can even expect them to.

I do think they knew him long enough for there to be a sense of betrayal, or rather, it was a short time but the events that transpired were meaninful, Asuka didn't seem to have had many friends before & almost thought she could be happy & let go of her morbid competitiveness before everything went to crap.

That's enough to color their perspective toward a 'betrayal-ish' point, at least from Asuka's Pov (It's only when she sees him again from her adult perspective that she realizes, "No, not even an idiot, a brat." And just kinda hates him more because, why did this have to happen to her? )

Though I think in Misato's case it's more that she's trying hard to stay detached & feels partially responsible for the deaths he caused, in part because he is something like a son to her. Kinda like Kurama in Elfen Lied. And a family bond is something rather persistent even if it's ruined beyond repair, hence, why she could not kill him.

But let's not whitewash this because we understand & emphasize with the characters or happen to be more mature than Shinji is rn, - their treatment of him is awful and undeserved. It is, however, perfectly realistic and as such dosn't mean that they're generally awful people; The random WILLE recruits certainly see Misato as a beacon of hope; She's objectively a hero, fighting against impossible odds and whatnot; That can coexist with them bein awful to Shinji. You can't blame in on "no time to explain" given that he was in a cell for a while and that the info they did eventually give him was missing the most crucial bits.

The sheer weight & of '14 years of post-apocalyptic wasteland, everything they worked for thrashed' is pretty much what gives the movie it's emotional Oopmf of true inescapable despair, or, at least it feels inescapable to Shinji; Kaworu disagreed but, he's dead now so Shinji's on his own for Final.


Ultimately, they are ALL being manipulated by Gendo and ALL "within expected parameters" - Shinji was just meant to be the trigger piece of the shooting machinery because Gendo willed it so but he had no clue what even happened because no one told him he was sitting in a doomsday machine; It's likely that everyone involved inadvertedly 'facilitated' this outcome.

Tellingly, Mari and Kaworu (the only two people who seem to grasp the full extent of what Gendo's playing, or as close to it as it gets) don't seem to blame Shinji; At most they're like, "but that's not how the other's see it." and "Figure out how things work so you don't get fooled again!" which are simply things he needs to know if he is to take back any sort of agency from Gendo's hands - And heck, even with knowing, Kaworu & Mari weren't able to change that much, and Shinji just recently became aware that there IS a plan

Technically it's good that he knows, but for him to get in a mindset where he's likely to do something with that knowledge beyond "stay TF away from it so I don't fuck up anything else" it will take a lot, especially given that the last person who convinced him to try doing something about it lost his head. And now he's got to make his own plan - or he could follow along with WILLE's but that's got it's own difficulties.

Kendrix wrote:She's objectively a hero, fighting against impossible odds and whatnot; That can coexist with them bein awful to Shinji. You can't blame in on "no time to explain" given that he was in a cell for a while and that the info they did eventually give him was missing the most crucial bits.

Are we still going at it? They didn't gave him the most crucial bits because they didn't had enough time, because right in the middle of their explanation Mark.09 came out of nowhere and started wrecking shit everywhere. And before that Misato had her hands full making sure that her fleet wasn't followed by hordes of murderous killer bio-bots anymore.

Yeah, recycling the same tired arguments isn't gonna do anyone any good. No one's gonna buy the "Misato is a war criminal" line, and both the "she treated Shinji horribly" and the "She withheld crucial information" arguments have been thoroughly debunked. Let's move on to something new, eh?

Bagheera wrote:No one's gonna buy the "Misato is a war criminal" line

Misato is a what now?

Arcadia's legacy wrote:Misato is a what now?

It was an argument Kendrix pushed a few years back when Q first came out, mainly pointing to the bomb collar business. She's backed it off now to "Misato and Asuka are horrible people, but that's totally realistic given their current circumstances", blithely ignoring the fact that they are not, in fact, depicted as horrible people in the movie, and likewise the fact that they do not do horrible things in the movie. It's a fundamentally twisted way of looking at the characters, since the whole point of the movie is that Shinji is the one who's doing horrible things for understandable reasons. He didn't mean to start near-3I, but he did. He didn't mean to start 4I, but he did. He didn't mean to wreck the world, but he did. His friends are angry at him because he keeps doing these things and they have no way to stop him. And so they act of of desperation and do maybe silly things because he's a freakin' impact trigger and they don't have the heart to just execute him outright, which is what they would do if they were as ruthlessly pragmatic as Kendrix argues them to be.

cyharding wrote:That's pretty much it. This is the first time I've delved into something this much regarding Eva. I have more to say regarding this subject, but it would be specualtion and this thread might not be the right place for it. I should also note that jcmoorehead's post-3.33 fic, "Hand Cannot Erase," touches the subject a little, so I was convinced I haven't completely gone mad. If any mod or admin feels thsi should go somewhere else, feel free to move it. Thank you for your time.

It's admittedly speculation, but you make some good points. There's a lot we don't know about 3I, and someone had to start 3I proper. If that was BM-01 or BM-02 that would explain a hell of a lot.

Bagheera wrote:It was an argument Kendrix pushed a few years back when Q first came out, mainly pointing to the bomb collar business. She's backed it off now to "Misato and Asuka are horrible people, but that's totally realistic given their current circumstances", blithely ignoring the fact that they are not, in fact, depicted as horrible people in the movie, and likewise the fact that they do not do horrible things in the movie. It's a fundamentally twisted way of looking at the characters, since the whole point of the movie is that Shinji is the one who's doing horrible things for understandable reasons. He didn't mean to start near-3I, but he did. He didn't mean to start 4I, but he did. He didn't mean to wreck the world, but he did. His friends are angry at him because he keeps doing these things and they have no way to stop him. And so they act of of desperation and do maybe silly things because he's a freakin' impact trigger and they don't have the heart to just execute him outright, which is what they would do if they were as ruthlessly pragmatic as Kendrix argues them to be.

Last year, I spent weeks trying to clean up the Rebuild pages on TVTropes after I saw that it was overrun with arguments like that. It really disturbs me how there is no sympathy for the people of Wille, especially Misato and Asuka. Even though he did not mean to do it, Shinji had victimized them at least once before his disappearance through his actions (or lack thereof) in Unit 01. To me, their actions read less as hatred and more as extreme measures to defend themselves against his terrible judgement and lack of concern for others. The minute Kaworu lifts the burden of accountability from him, he meakes the same mistakes again.

That's why I find Shinji to be less sympathetic than his co-stars. They have to live with the consequences of his mistakes for a decade and a half. Consequences that include a military takeover of their home base, an all-out war with Nerv, and another apocalypse of vague proportions. Unit 01 insulates him from all of that and he only has to see the wreckage of...something long after the dust has settled. But it's everyone else who's ignorant and doesn't understand anything, not Shinji. I'm willing to bet Asuka experienced many of the same things Shinji did after she was freed from quarantine and had to work to earn everyone's trust back.

I know. I know. but this particular line bugged me and I needed to talk about it.

Many religions allow for absolute unconditional forgiveness. Even if this is as much honoured in the breach as the observance, it shows that humans have that capacity or can seriously consider it.

You are aware Anno is an Agnostic/Atheist right?

Ray wrote:You are aware Anno is an Agnostic/Atheist right?

The quotation demonstrates that human beings have the capacity for forgiveness, using religion as an example. It's not saying you need to be religious to be forgiving, or that lack of religion would mean you're not forgiving. Anno being an agnostic/atheist is a moot point (also, source?). Everything about the man and his relationship with Eva points to him believing in forgiveness, particularly self-forgiveness and acceptance if Shinji is any indication at all.

Guilt is an amazing thing to live with, and the concept of redemption may seem like an impossibility, but many of the demons we face are distortions of reality caused by negative thinking, and forgiveness is possible. This is exactly what Q displays by isolating Shinji and making it seem like his former friends now hate his guts, when the reality of their relationship with him isn't quite so black and white. The fantastical elements of the series (the Angels, ADAMs, Evas, etc) play on the theme of distorted realities, and Q cranks it up to 11, making the setting feel even more surreal and alien. Things aren't always as bad as we make things out to be in our heads, and in Final, I expect even the setting to start looking a little more familiar/human. Blue water is coming.

EDIT: everything is allegory.

Sachi wrote:Anno being an agnostic/atheist is a moot point (also, source?).

Hideaki Anno In An Interview wrote: "I don't belong to any organized religion, I guess I could be considered an agnostic.

Source

Guilt is an amazing thing to live with, and the concept of redemption may seem like an impossibility, but many of the demons we face are distortions of reality caused by negative thinking, and forgiveness is possible.

What's the difference between 'Negative thinking' and accepting reality as it is? Lots of people getting on my case for being 'negative'. Sometimes reality isn't distorted by negative feelings. We feel negative because of reality. In the case of Shinji, the Chicken comes before the egg. The world Shinji lives in ISN"T a distorted mental reality. It IS reality. Well. . . the constructed reality of the EVA-Verse, but still. and it's something he can NEVER undo.

Allegory tends to fall apart when placed in a gritty realistic consequence heavy world, and if Anno has a 'hail mary pass' revealing Shinji didn't do what 3.33 hammered over his head he did and could never undo. Well I'm not going to say it would ruin the series at this point, but it would run counter to any allegorical intent.

Eva old and new operates on multiple levels. One of those is allegory. This is an important part of the equation to consider. Storytelling that wants to connect with its audience needs to give them something to connect with. Since time immemorial, this has been done, in large part, through narrative symbols. This allows the story to be both enjoyed as what it is on the surface (say, a tale of epic adventure full of fantasy beasts), and to communicate deeper human truths to the audience, providing a useful platform through which the good and the bad of real life can be filtered into meaningful personal and social narrative. When approaching Eva, all of these facets must be considered and embraced, as it is NOT a documentary about a fictional post-apocalyptic world, but a deliberately woven fictional narrative that has things it wants to communicate to us. You're treating NTE's narrative vehicle as an end unto itself, it seems, rather than something you're supposed to ride to get to a particular point.

Regarding negativity, the human psychological apparatus is equipped with various checks and balances which facilitates our ability to navigate a constantly changing world. The capacity to see the negative is a crucial part of this, but for optimal functionality and fullness of perspective it must be balanced out in some way. The only way to avoid becoming trapped in a world of distortions is to remain capable of seeing multiple possibilities.