Does Asuka know she's fighting the dummy plug?

[boyfrand]

In EoE, does Asuka know she is fighting against evas piloted by the dummy plug system? Also, is the dummy plug system used individually by each of the mpe or do they operate in tandem?

Tangentially, do you think Asuka will know that it was the dummy plug system that destroyed her in NME?

[Jornophelanthas]

In EoE, does Asuka know she is fighting against evas piloted by the dummy plug system? Also, is the dummy plug system used individually by each of the mpe or do they operate in tandem?

I doubt Asuka knows or cares about what the MP Evangelions are and how they are operated. She could easily assume they're just another weird type of Angel.
Don't forget that she is exhilarated because of finding her mother's presence, unaware of anything that happened since being kept unconscious after her mental breakdown, not communicating with mission command, and in a berserk frenzy.

Tangentially, do you think Asuka will know that it was the dummy plug system that destroyed her in NME?

I doubt Asuka was even conscious. And even if she were, the Angel was blocking all screen input inside her entry plug anyway. If she was synchronized at all, she would be aware of moving and fighting something at best, let alone identify Unit-01.

[Reichu]

I doubt Asuka knows or cares about what the MP Evangelions are

When she sees them for the first time, she remarks, "The Eva Series has been completed?"

I doubt Asuka was even conscious.

Maybe not in the usual way, but she apparently fused with the 9th on a pretty intimate level. (Production went so far as to have Miyamura provide the voice for Eva-03.)

[Viking]

[..]She could easily assume they're just another weird type of Angel.[..]

Maybe I'm wrong, but I remember her saying something like "The Mass Production Evangelions"... but it's a long time since I last watched EoE.

What I figured out anyway is that when fighting the last angels ( starting from Matarael, correct me if I'm wrong ), they don't aim for the core.
The same for Asuka that didn't aim for the S2 during the action, something that could have changed the outcome of the battle with the MP EVAs.

Bye

[Ceimoa Nan]

She knows they're Evas, and after the Bardiel battle, I'd bet that she was told what happened with Shinji and Unit 01. So she might consider the possibility that she's fighting dummy plugs... but how could she have known?

What really interests me is whether or not Asuka thought she was fighting other 14-year-olds. I'd kinda think that would've been cooler, if in EoE, there were nine new 14-year-old pilots we catch a glimpse of before the fight begins. After all, Asuka didn't have any qualms about killing JSSDF soldiers, and I'd think not every JSSDF soldier was a complete, child-killing monster.

But having the Evas piloted by Kaworu's dummy plugs had its own elegance, because then Asuka got the chance to prove herself against the pilot sent to replace her.

[boyfrand]

I doubt Asuka was even conscious. And even if she were, the Angel was blocking all screen input inside her entry plug anyway. If she was synchronized at all, she would be aware of moving and fighting something at best, let alone identify Unit-01.

I think I meant for my question to be more like: Do you think she'll be told the dummy plug was used against 03?

What really interests me is whether or not Asuka thought she was fighting other 14-year-olds.

lol this is actually why I thought of this thread, but forgot to include it

[Bagheera]

When she sees them for the first time, she remarks, "The Eva Series has been completed?"

Indeed. It's not clear how she knows about them, but she appears to know what they are. The question of whether or not they're piloted by humans probably never occurred to her, and I doubt she'd pay it any mind if it did. She clearly has no qualms about killing folks who are out to get her.

[Azathoth]

Indeed. It's not clear how she knows about them, but she appears to know what they are.

Given the amount of time she implicitly spends staring over Kaji's shoulder while he's doing...whatever his supposed job is...I'd be more surprised if she didn't know.

She clearly has no qualms about killing folks who are out to get her.

She has minimal qualms about killing folks who aren't out to get her. How many full-crewed ships does she play hopscotch on, again?

[Na7e]

She has minimal qualms about killing folks who aren't out to get her. How many full-crewed ships does she play hopscotch on, again?

How many angels does it take to wipe out a fleet? Not like she had much choice in the matter, probably saved more lives by doing something than
nothing.

[Azathoth]

Does it matter? Asuka's goal is not to save anyone's life in particular, as she has no problems admitting. She's out there because she wants to kick ass and look cool, and in pursuit of that goal would quite probably kill any number of fourteen-year-olds, or people of any other age, for that matter. I'm not faulting her. It's a positive goal, and what good is a giant robot that doesn't lend its pilot moral invulnerability?

[valshon]

I think I meant for my question to be more like: Do you think she'll be told the dummy plug was used against 03?

So if I understand your question, another way of posing it to her would be "It wasn't Shinji that delivered that ungodly beatdown, It was the dummy system"

I don't think that it crossed her mind between when she regained consciousness in the Eva at the bottom of the lake to the point that she lost consciousness/died. Unless the bridge crew went off on some wild tangent and told her off camera.

[Na7e]

Does it matter? Asuka's goal is not to save anyone's life in particular, as she has no problems admitting. She's out there because she wants to kick ass and look cool, and in pursuit of that goal would quite probably kill any number of fourteen-year-olds, or people of any other age, for that matter. I'm not faulting her. It's a positive goal, and what good is a giant robot that doesn't lend its pilot moral invulnerability?

The sad part is, I agree with you sorry about that. Probably should have read more carefully, thanks for clarifying. I just thought you were taking a random shot at her. I never saw it from a moral angle, she was just going after her goal, with the resources available, and in the end probably saved more people. So...yeah my apologies.

[Bagheera]

She has minimal qualms about killing folks who aren't out to get her. How many full-crewed ships does she play hopscotch on, again?

That can be written off as "teenager not thinking things through". It's rather different when you're actively squishing people.

[boyfrand]

I don't think that it crossed her mind between when she regained consciousness in the Eva at the bottom of the lake to the point that she lost consciousness/died. Unless the bridge crew went off on some wild tangent and told her off camera.

Sorry if I lost you, or if you lost me lol
I was referring to NME with that specific question, yes I know this is the wrong board.

Back on topic: Hmmm, while I did consider her motivation as a pilot (basically, being a superstar), I wondered if she thought she was fighting some other kids? If she did think they were kids piloting the mpe series, I bet she would love to defeat all of them to prove she's the best. But also, she would also love to prove she's better than a computer/dummy plug.

I guess it doesn't matter to her if she knew she was fighting the dummy plug system or not because she wants to kick ass either way lol so this thread ended up being just for my own curiosity

[Azathoth]

That can be written off as "teenager not thinking things through". It's rather different when you're actively squishing people.

Again, what grounds do you have to suggest that she cares? In Asuka's opinion, the only reason other people exist is to better showcase the importance of Asuka (and there is not a whole lot in the show to suggest that she is wrong to think so). Or in case you haven't noticed, in EoE she spends quite a lot of time actively squishing people, people who she has in fact concluded are no particular threat to her.

Even if we do assume that her actions in Air can't be taken as wholly her actions (something which I don't think is an especially useful assumption), there is still rather a lot of emphasis in this show on just how little Asuka cares about the things everyone else cares about. For her, the object of the game is to win, preferably with elegance and style; failing that, obscene slam-death bloodlust ("Erste! ") suits her just fine. Saving the world doesn't matter to her. Collateral damage doesn't matter to her. It says a lot about her that when the initial operation to destroy Israfel fails, everyone else is fearing the end of the world or the destruction of Nerv's reputation, while Asuka is annoyed that Shinji fucked up her debut.

Would she walk up to another 14-year-old on the street, rip their heart out, and eat it? Probably not, no, if only because that would be pretty difficult. Would she squish a 14-year-old with her Eva? Fuck, even Shinji could be convinced to do that. For all that people like to speculate (and ship) about a role-reversal of ep24: I feel like if Asuka's piloting, regardless of her trauma at the revelation that Kaworu's a magical space homo, the episode would have been less "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" and more "Frenzied Detruncation"

[Ceimoa Nan]

Honestly, I think that in Episode 8, Asuka assumed the personnel on the UN fleet would get out of her way. If that doesn't seem realistic in real life, I think that's at least how it was within the story. You saw people running away before she landed in one shot, and the observers only drew attention to structural damage, I think they'd mention it if troops were being squished.

In EoE, they went at lengths to portray the JSSDF soldiers as monsters. Taking out a 14-year-old execution style, burning people alive, shooting people while they surrender or try to drag away a comrade, burning them again. Of course there's nothing to say that Asuka should know what monsters these guys are, but that's the impression I had when watching the movie. Asuka wouldn't be okay with taking out VTOLs if she didn't think of them as an enemy. "I won't lose... to you guys!" "あんたたち！" was the Japanese word, right? "Antatachi." Not very respectful. I don't know, for some reason I just assumed she saw them for the monsters we saw them as. That she had the same justification Misato did when Misato rescued Shinji. Misato probably didn't feel any remorse for shooting those guys, why should Asuka feel remorse for fighting against her attackers? But I'm sure everybody else would say she just woke up, saw things attacking her, and fought back, having no idea what the context was?

Then again, I did feel sorry for the commander guy when he said they'd failed. Not having a clue what was really going on, how they were just Seele's pawn. And earlier, there's a JSSDF soldier helping another walk, and the MP Eva lands on them. Those scenes are supposed to humanize them, right? And nothing prior to EoE portrayed the JSSDF as villains. The takeover is just supposed to disgust us, whether we hold every single JSSDF soldier responsible or not.

A much more clear-cut example is how Asuka reacted to Bardiel. Well, not really, since we didn't actually get to see her fight against it. But as far as we could tell, Asuka was prepared to take out Bardiel even while knowing Toji was in there. And she knew that 14-year-old.

Asuka is a narcissist, not a sociopath. Can we really say nothing about her friendship with Hikari was genuine? It's easier for her to kill when her enemy is trying to kill her. (The JSSDF did manage to cut her umbilical cable. She wasn't going to stand there and wait for them to run out of ammo.) She was also ordered to take out the MP Evas by Misato, and, on top of the fact that she had to assume the MP Evas were sent to kill her, we all know how much easier it is for normal people to harm others when ordered to.

[Mr. Tines]

We do have to speculate about exactly what Asuka's nigh a decade of pilot training covered, and how much her last stand was working on responses that had been hammered in over the years.

Would she walk up to another 14-year-old on the street, rip their heart out, and eat it? Probably not, no, if only because that would be pretty difficult. Would she squish a 14-year-old with her Eva? Fuck, even Shinji could be convinced to do that. For all that people like to speculate (and ship) about a role-reversal of ep24: I feel like if Asuka's piloting, regardless of her trauma at the revelation that Kaworu's a magical space homo, the episode would have been less "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" and more "Frenzied Detruncation"

Nor did she walk up to another Eva on the battlefield, rip their S2 organ out and eat it, even if that might have been a winning move.

And the role swap in episode 24 doesn't really work unless Kaworu swings Asuka's way, so no magical space homo for you. Magical space lesbian, perhaps.

[Bagheera]

Again, what grounds do you have to suggest that she cares?

I'm not suggesting she does. I"m just noting the comparison isn't relevant because the situations are entirely different.

[boyfrand]

A much more clear-cut example is how Asuka reacted to Bardiel. Well, not really, since we didn't actually get to see her fight against it. But as far as we could tell, Asuka was prepared to take out Bardiel even while knowing Toji was in there. And she knew that 14-year-old.

wow, that's an excellent point that i didn't consider before! thanks for bringing it to our attention. i haven't seen that episode in a while, so i'll have to rewatch it soon to find out if she was simply following orders or was following her orders because she understood that the angel infected unit 03.

[Bagheera]

A much more clear-cut example is how Asuka reacted to Bardiel. Well, not really, since we didn't actually get to see her fight against it. But as far as we could tell, Asuka was prepared to take out Bardiel even while knowing Toji was in there. And she knew that 14-year-old.

Not so clear-cut, actually. In that scene she was mostly distracted by the fact Shinji didn't know Touji was the pilot, and that's arguably why she got taken out so easily. She still didn't care about the pilot, but she did care about the fact that Shinji didn't know who it was.

Asuka is a narcissist, not a sociopath.

She isn't either, actually. She shows empathy for others at various points throughout the series (i.e. not a sociopath) and she's too steeped in self-hatred to be a narcissist. If we were to classify her behavior it would be histrionic, not narcissistic.