Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

Discussion of the new series of Evangelion movies ( "Evangelion Shin Gekijōban", meaning "Evangelion: New Theatrical Edition"). The final instalment made its debut in Japan on March 8, 2021.

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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby ACGT-Samael » Thu May 03, 2018 2:09 pm

The reason I find it confusing is because Reichu is right - the name really does imply Mark.09 was made from the core of one of the Adams. If the ship already belonged to the Adams, that just calls into question what powered the ship originally and why that wouldn't count as its "original master".

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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby BlueBasilisk » Thu May 03, 2018 3:54 pm

Well, Nebuchadnezzar's Key is little more than a very small and basic nervous system attached to a syringe. Kaji calls it the "lost number" so if it was an Adam that exploded it's possible that Seele was able to salvage some parts from it to build the Vessel of the Adams. If the loss of Mark.06 to cause Third Impact wasn't part of the plan, they might have needed to kitbash Mark.09 together from whatever parts they had to fill in the gap. That black form is called a "transitional form" and it starts turning into Bardiel-like Blue Goo when it lands on Wunder, so I suppose it could have originally been some kind of goo monster forced into human form like some of the other Evas were, or Seele simply engineered it that way using what they learned from Unit 03.

Wunder originally being an Adam ship makes some sense, but on the other hand, why would they need one? Adams can fly and survive in the vacuum of space with no apparent harm. Mark.06 was just chilling on the moon for 14 years completely unprotected.
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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby Reichu » Thu May 03, 2018 4:09 pm

Things got busy here! Lots of little things to respond to. This post will be more piecemeal than I prefer to be. Not sure why quoting didn't yield links to the original posts; I'm too tired to fix it manually.

View Original PostDarkBluePhoenix wrote:So the Mark.09 is the living embodiment of one of the Adam's (or all of the Adam's) souls(s), similar to how Kaworu in the show was the reincarnation/vessel of Adam.

I only quoted part of the post, so some context was missing. It's here and quite short, but pretty concentrated in its weirdness. The replies by BB and Sam are also worth reading.

At the moment, I treat it as a serious possibility that the Adams have been split apart into body, core, and soul. (That sounds bizarre, I know, but Q firmly establishes that these movies embrace a particular form of world-building insanity that is not to be underestimated.) In some cases, these three components still exist, along with the corresponding Spear, which I suppose might be considered an honorary fourth piece. The Fruit of Life could be considered a fifth, and one that has possibly been lost, since the Adams revert to radiant giant form upon absorbing an Angel's FoL. I assume Mark.06 wasn't able to absorb the 12th Angel because we're told it was autonomous at the time -- no pilot inside. If the non-Rei pilots all possess Adams' souls, this makes sense, and also conveniently explains why Shinji was able to keep Eva-13 "live" after Kaworu died.

Having Adam's soul would probably make it able to operate the Wunder in a similar fashion to Unit-01, as stated in the movie, which supports this assumption.

This part is tricky. At the moment, I tentatively assume the core plays some kind of key role in the Wunder's functioning, and an "original" Adam core such as Mark.09 takes priority over the mockup that was probably swapped into Eva-01's body. I myself wonder why, since core material seems pretty homogenous, but here's a possibility: cores in NTE can be imprinted with and retain soul data, and the Adams' cores retain the impressions* of their original souls long after separation. With or without further Nerv's meddling on Nerv's part, this is enough to convince the Wunder that "I'm the real deal and Eva-01 isn't; cede control to me".

Something else comes to mind. A list of observations first:

- When inside both the orbital prison and the Wunder's "heart", Eva-01 fills the empty space in her container with core material.
- Mark.09 is a giant polymorphous core.
- Being a giant polymorphous core does not impact Mark.09's ability to function as the Wunder's master in any way.
- When Mark.13 hijacks the Wunder, it expressly drops extensions of its body into the container holding Eva-01. Unclear if this is in order to reach Eva-01, because said container grants access to the ship, or both.

It occurs to me that Wunder, while being a very Angel-like being, does not have a core of its own. That core is furnished by the being placed inside its heart. Eva-01 is shown (indirectly) to fill the empty space with a matrix of core, as if she is extending her own core into one giant one. The Wunder's heart could function as a mold: you put a soul inside, let that soul fill the heart up and convert it into a giant core, and you're good to go. The heart is presumably "wired" so that it lets the soul inside perform all the necessary functions for the ship's body, and Eva-01 having already generated a matrix of core in there may have just acted as a shortcut for Mark.09. It wouldn't have needed to create a core for the Wunder from scratch, just plug itself into the one that Eva-01 had created.

I don't have a real explanation for why Eva-01 creates a core cocoon in the orbital prison, but the fact that she creates one in the Wunder as well is similarlyn unresolved matter, so I'll throw a wild guess out there. Tying into the idea that the Wunder was the Adams' ship, maybe the Adams (in their awakened state) just reflexively form a cocoon of core around themselves if they find themselves in a specific kind of enclosed environment. The containment technology used for the Wunder's heart is intrinsically some kind of weird Eldritch biotech, and it's imitated for use inside the prison. For... reasons. Yeah, pffff, I dunno.

* In case this soul imprint stuff sounds like it's coming out of nowhere, a couple of relevant posts:

Reichu wrote:The label on [Eva-02's] core says "SENSITIVE HARDWARE CONTAINED INSIDE". While that might be some kind of "euphemism", it does at least imply that "core units" contain something, and, going by the "hardware" analog, that something can be taken out of one container (think of a computer tower) and put into another / swapped with something else...


View Original PostReichu wrote:They probably did [ditch the idea of having a human "soul" in the Evas]. Eva-01 is some sort of exception on account of being an early experimental type. For the rest, it's the cover story from NGE made reality: the cores (actually "core units" in the films) house nothing more than personality data, digitized using Magi-type tech. This explains why pilots can hop from Eva to Eva like they're trying to catch a VD, and means that their ability to pilot isn't lost if their Eva gets blown up or placed in bondage as an energy source or something. (Anyone wonder why there are visual parallels between Yui and Eva-13? I sure as hell did -- until I figured there just might be a copy of Yui's personality data in the core for Shinji to sync with.)


--------------

DarkBluePhoenix wrote:I also wonder about the meanings of the designations given to the EVAs, switching between "Unit-##" and "Mark.##" must also hold some kind of significance.

The standard explanation I've heard is that the Unit ones are Nerv Evas while the Mark ones are Seele Evas. Seems to pan out. Eva-13 diverges from both naming schemes, as Sam pointed out, which might be because it's neither a Nerv unit nor a Seele one: it's both.

BlueBasilisk wrote:I'm sure this has been brought up before, but do we have any way of knowing if "Adams" is being used as both the singular and plural forms like "Lilin" is? I can't think of any instances where the films used a singular "Adam" but that could simply be a result of phrasing.

Since there are plural Adams now, the default term is "Adams" -- not strictly necessary from a grammatical perspective, but it does create the most impact, via the contrast against NGE. And Japanese being Japanese, it's not going to bother itself alternating between "Adam" and "Adams" depending on whether it's talking about one or multiple. Compare the usage of "Eva Series" as an informal way of referencing Evas 05~13; Japanese will use the term "Eva Series" (in English) regardless of whether one or many are being referred to. (There's also "Children", but that's less straightforward since it's not just used as a general term but also in individual titles...)

Possibly unnecessary crash course: Most Japanese words do not have a plural form, and even the few that do still see the regular form used far more often, regardless of number. (E.g. hito=person or people, hitobito=people.) Typically, if the number of something needs to specified in a way that isn't apparent from context, counters are used. With the Evas, for instance, it's usually -tai (体): ittai is one Eva, nitai is two Evas, etc.

ACGT-Samael wrote:My answer for the 0 Synch rate is that, given WILLE's clearly willing to withhold information from Shinji, they're probably not above lying to him about stuff. It's possible the 0 synch rate was fabricated to discourage him from trying to pilot.

I personally doubt it, mostly because the film goes to the trouble of introducing a new concept just for this one screen. Unless I'm blanking out on the first two films, it's the first and only time a "deep synchronization test" is mentioned. This is obviously not for Shinji's benefit, but for the sorts of audience members who pay attention to what's in Eva's signature computer displays. This raises the question of what difference, exactly, is being signified with the addition of "deep". I mean, did they perform it while Shinji was still in the "Great Beyond" or something...? The distinction isn't entirely unimportant, either. If Shinji's sync rate was 0 before they even extracted him, it means Eva-01 saved Asuka on her own. It could also mean other interesting things I'm too tired to currently offer up on my own.

[EDIT: Never mind, the screen refers to a BM-3, so the test was done after his extraction. I've got no ideas at the moment, then. Falsification can't be entirely ruled out, since Wille conducting a sync test between Shinji and Eva-01 is completely at odds with everything else they've said and makes absolutely no sense. But I still suspect there is something that's not being taken into consideration, so for me it's entirely indeterminate at the moment.]

BlueBasilisk wrote:Wunder originally being an Adam ship makes some sense, but on the other hand, why would they need one? Adams can fly and survive in the vacuum of space with no apparent harm. Mark.06 was just chilling on the moon for 14 years completely unprotected.

I remember the suggestion from olden days that Wunder is a rough analogue for the Black Moon. We're not really sure what the Black Moon's function in NTE is, either, but it's probably something stranger than mere transportation.
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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby BlueBasilisk » Thu May 03, 2018 5:34 pm

View Original PostReichu wrote:At the moment, I treat it as a serious possibility that the Adams have been split apart into body, core, and soul. (That sounds bizarre, I know, but Q firmly establishes that these movies embrace a particular form of world-building insanity that is not to be underestimated.) In some cases, these three components still exist, along with the corresponding Spear, which I suppose might be considered an honorary fourth piece. The Fruit of Life could be considered a fifth, and one that has possibly been lost, since the Adams revert to radiant giant form upon absorbing an Angel's FoL. I assume Mark.06 wasn't able to absorb the 12th Angel because we're told it was autonomous at the time -- no pilot inside. If the non-Rei pilots all possess Adams' souls, this makes sense, and also conveniently explains why Shinji was able to keep Eva-13 "live" after Kaworu died.


Depending how hard Anno wants to push the Adams = Ultras references, there might be something to this. I'm watching Ultraman Tiga right now, and in the backstory, Tiga was a Giant of Light whose essence left his body on Earth and returned home. Eventually he was reincarnated as the human protagonist, who is turned into light and absorbed into the original body when his life is in danger, restoring Tiga to his true form and giving the human the ability to transform. Most of the Ultras either take on a human form or a human host but this is the first time something like that happened. And it's the first series that came out after Evangelion hit. Maybe some recursive influence? :lol:

I really like the Children are Adams theory, but that's left something of a headscratcher with Unit 13. Neither Shinji or Kaworu wanted it to awaken and it didn't seem like they'd gone into the core, so what was controlling it to swallow the 12th Angel and raise the Black Moon? That would certainly seem to imply that the Eva has some kind of will of its own, or could that be chalked up to the "personality data" imprinted on the core?

View Original PostReichu wrote:I remember the suggestion from olden days that Wunder is a rough analogue for the Black Moon. We're not really sure what the Black Moon's function in NTE is, either, but it's probably something stranger than mere transportation.

I remember that too now that you mention it. Someone also pointed out that it resembles a spermatozoon with a bunch of mechanical kibble stapled on top. The "bones" on the underside even twist together in a double helix. Wouldn't be surprised if one of the Instrumentality scenarios requires it to fly into the Black Moon to do...something something sexual metaphor. :freud:

And thanks for the crash course on Japanese. I wondering if the English version might be adding to the confusion by calling it the Vessel of the Adams and perhaps adding an implication of plurality that might not have existed in the original.
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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby Settie » Thu May 03, 2018 8:34 pm

View Original PostReichu wrote:
I don't have a real explanation for why Eva-01 creates a core cocoon in the orbital prison, but the fact that she creates one in the Wunder as well is similarlyn unresolved matter, so I'll throw a wild guess out there. Tying into the idea that the Wunder was the Adams' ship, maybe the Adams (in their awakened state) just reflexively form a cocoon of core around themselves if they find themselves in a specific kind of enclosed environment. The containment technology used for the Wunder's heart is intrinsically some kind of weird Eldritch biotech, and it's imitated for use inside the prison. For... reasons. Yeah, pffff, I dunno.


I think one thing to keep in mid is that eva tech improved in the 14 year time skip. Best example of it are the Mark-4s, they're not angels but have the same pattern as them, they don't seem to have pilots but are capable of autonomous activity. If they're manufactured then those angel-like cores are man-made and humanity has some ability to create core material. Perhaps the core material surrounding Unit-1 in the coffin and in the Wunder was man-made and not created by Unit-1.


The distinction isn't entirely unimportant, either. If Shinji's sync rate was 0 before they even extracted him, it means Eva-01 saved Asuka on her own. It could also mean other interesting things I'm too tired to currently offer up on my own.


But the information was for Shinjis benefit as well, not only was he not allowed to pilot, he couldn't according to their test (yet the choker was a precaution because of Unit-1s activation). So it's not that far fetched that it was Shinji, if what Ritsuko said at the end of 2.0 that Unit-1 was responding to Shinjis wish wasn't mere hyperbole. then Reis desire to spare Shinji the pain caused by piloting and Shinjis desire to help his fellow pilots wouldn't be that far fetched as explanation for that event.

BlueBasilisk wrote:
I really like the Children are Adams theory, but that's left something of a headscratcher with Unit 13. Neither Shinji or Kaworu wanted it to awaken and it didn't seem like they'd gone into the core, so what was controlling it to swallow the 12th Angel and raise the Black Moon? That would certainly seem to imply that the Eva has some kind of will of its own, or could that be chalked up to the "personality data" imprinted on the core?


Could be simple programming, like the dummy plug but more advanced. I'm thinking the 14 year saw advancements in programming for evas, like some pseudo-AI that could make them act autonomous to a certain extent, like the Mark-6 was said to be, or the Mark-4s. Unit-13 could've been programmed to eat the angel and enter its awakened state with Gendo depending on Kaworu and Willie to stop the 4i with Kaworu regaining control and stabbing Unit-13 with the spears before exploding and Mari ejecting Shinji.

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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby Reichu » Thu May 03, 2018 9:18 pm

View Original PostBlueBasilisk wrote:I really like the Children are Adams theory, but that's left something of a headscratcher with Unit 13. Neither Shinji or Kaworu wanted it to awaken and it didn't seem like they'd gone into the core, so what was controlling it to swallow the 12th Angel and raise the Black Moon? That would certainly seem to imply that the Eva has some kind of will of its own, or could that be chalked up to the "personality data" imprinted on the core?

About going into the core, I'm under the impression that the entry plug is inserted into the core by default, and it's merely the internal array that moves when the "plug depth" increases. The interior is shown moving on a rail in visuals. With Asuka, we get a bit of visual stylization, with her sprouting "wings" and being visibly pushed forward. So I'm guessing that a junction between the plug and whatever is inside the core is required for sync to occur, and physical distance between pilot and the "sensitive hardware" determines the extent of the sync. (This again raises the question of why in the world Nerv would explicitly design the plugs to allow undesirable levels of contact to occur, but... ehhhhhhhh.)

Feeding back into "the Children are Adams", we have that screen from 1.0 that shows, in contrast to the implied paradigm in NGE (cf. Asuka's epiphany in EoE), that 01's ATF is sourcing from both the core unit and the plug. This again makes sense if the pilots are serving as the "true souls" of the Evas. The plug allows the soul to be temporarily slotted back into a god-body, and the core enables the soul to radiate with the body and project the ATF, which it would not be able to do with Lilin form alone.

This could also, potentially, make sense of why Yui's presence inside the core is called a "control system". First consider, for contrast purposes: in NGE, Yui and company provide the Evas' resident souls, making the Evas complete and thus functional beings. They're kept in a form of bondage that can only be circumvented by child pilots, presumably because this makes them easier to control than the alternative of giving them free reign. Here in NTE, the Evas' "resident souls" are (according to the hypothesis we're both considering) those of the pilots', rather than what's in the core. So, then, what is in the core, and what exactly is it doing? If the core-pilot dynamic is reversed, maybe the situation is reversed in other ways as well. Rather than the pilot providing a way to keep the power of the Eva's soul in check, the contents of the core unit do something to contain the power of the pilot's soul. At the moment, I'm not sure how this would work, but, going along with the idea that an implanted personality forms the base of the control system, consider what was achieved with the Magi in NGE -- they act as their own control system.

I'll have to sleep on this on bit. Hopefully someone else feels inspired.

Oh, right, I was supposed to be responding to your thing. Doh! That whole sequence is so dense that, full disclaimer, I still have no real idea what's going on. So this is going to be a bunch of wild speculation, possibly marred by tiredness and a failure to double check every last detail.

The liberation of the 12th Angel, the beginning of 13's pseudo-evolution, and Kaworu's "fall" from Alpha to Omega all happen at roughly the same time, which means they're probably connected. Kaworu's behavior is very strange here, and it leaves the question open of exactly what is happening to him. Since he'd regarded himself as the First Angel -- the only Eva pilot to do so -- his "Adamic essence" is probably "purer" than Shinji's, which makes him more suited for powering the Eva's awakening, even against his own will. The Angel seems to be attracted to Eva-13, and rather than attack it or engage in some other form of hostility, it forms a protective cocoon around it. Considering this Angel's role in the failed Third Impact, I wonder if it's just being opportunistic and attempting to reprise its efforts. A much more suitable Adam is available, and even if Lilith's body has disintegrated, it can be collected. (Recall that Eva-01 is able to absorb the Fruit of Life from the 10th Angel's liquid remains -- meaning that Lilith's LCL could similarly retain some of their vital properties post-image collapse.) Does it make contact with Eva-13 deliberately so it can break down the barriers between Kaworu and 13, thereby triggering the awakening? This whole Eva-13 and 13th Angel thing can't just be a coincidence......

I don't have any good ideas at the moment w.r.t whether or not the presence possibly implanted in 13's core was causing interference. Since this is a dual-piloted Eva, I guess it's an open question if there is a traditional control system at all, as in one that has the kind of presence that can be synced with -- or if the two pilots are instead just syncing with each other, which seems to be strongly implied. (Then again, they might be syncing with both each other AND a control system. Ugh.) Further complications might arise because the pilots secretly being reincarnated aliens means they have a hidden nature even Kaworu may not be fully aware of. So if this aspect of them were somehow freed, the result could be a tug-of-war with one's own fragmented self. To make things more complicated, if there is a traditional control system, there's the question of whether Kaworu fusing with Eva-13 means he also needs to fuse with whatever is in the core. I should really stop thinking about this tonight...

Someone also pointed out that it resembles a spermatozoon with a bunch of mechanical kibble stapled on top. The "bones" on the underside even twist together in a double helix. Wouldn't be surprised if one of the Instrumentality scenarios requires it to fly into the Black Moon to do...something something sexual metaphor. :freud:

This looks like it could be the original thread. (The intensity of the speculah back then was crazy. I figuratively cannot wait for our one last hurrah.)

I wondering if the English version might be adding to the confusion by calling it the Vessel of the Adams and perhaps adding an implication of plurality that might not have existed in the original.

This is definitely possible. I'm guessing Dan Kanemitsu's hands were tied here, since making a translation of the term actually sound fluent would probably require sacrificing ambiguity that is no doubt intentional. (I would ask him about it myself, but I'm an old person and social media terrifies me.)

Settie wrote:Perhaps the core material surrounding Unit-1 in the coffin and in the Wunder was man-made and not created by Unit-1.

The reason I say it's Eva-01's doing is that Eva-02's prosthetic arm immediately begins to convert into core after inserting the igniter into the Wunder's heart. You have to basically stepframe the movie here, but you can see the corrosion occur (confirmed as turning into core in the script) and Asuka quickly jettison the limb because of it. This brief moment lets us know that Eva-01 is emanating an core-ifying effect similar to what's seen more closely with 13 and Eva-08 later on, and it explains why core completely fills Eva-01's coffin. This is probably meant to be some kind of hint regarding Eva-01's mysterious role during Third Impact proper, but since there were some connections to be made with how the Wunder might function, I figured I might as well make them. In the unlikely instance they actually lead anywhere.

But the information was for Shinjis benefit as well

I was talking about the distinction between a plain old normal synchronization test and the "deep synchronization test" that is mentioned in the screen showing Shinji's 0% score and nowhere else. This isn't the sort of minuscule detail that Shinji would even begin to care about, meaning it's there for us.

Could be simple programming, like the dummy plug but more advanced. (snip)

I'd be hesitant to go there just yet. Both the dummy plug and whatever was controlling Mark.09 were accompanied by distinctive interface changes that told you loud and clear that an AI had taken over -- but no such thing was present when Eva-13 went berserk. In fact, there are no notable interface changes at all, unlike with Eva-03's possession by Angel, Eva-01 at the end of Ha, or Eva-02's Beast Modes. It's kind of strange now that I think about it...
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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby BlueBasilisk » Thu May 03, 2018 9:53 pm

View Original PostSettie wrote:I think one thing to keep in mid is that eva tech improved in the 14 year time skip. Best example of it are the Mark-4s, they're not angels but have the same pattern as them, they don't seem to have pilots but are capable of autonomous activity. If they're manufactured then those angel-like cores are man-made and humanity has some ability to create core material. Perhaps the core material surrounding Unit-1 in the coffin and in the Wunder was man-made and not created by Unit-1.

Nerv seems to have had the ability to manufacture cores or core material before the time skip. There are three cores embedded in the base of the sync test chamber seen in 2.22. The stuff in the tesseract could have been man made, but when Unit 02 makes contact with the igniter, the core erosion spreads up the artificial arm and turns the shoulder into a core-like object before it explodes. Unit 13 does the same thing to Unit 08's arms but the effect isn't as pronounced.

Could be simple programming, like the dummy plug but more advanced. I'm thinking the 14 year saw advancements in programming for evas, like some pseudo-AI that could make them act autonomous to a certain extent, like the Mark-6 was said to be, or the Mark-4s. Unit-13 could've been programmed to eat the angel and enter its awakened state with Gendo depending on Kaworu and Willie to stop the 4i with Kaworu regaining control and stabbing Unit-13 with the spears before exploding and Mari ejecting Shinji.

Fair point! Shinji notices Unit 13's controls have stopped responding at the same time the Vessel's SeeleOS starts up but it's flying before then and I'm pretty sure Shinji isn't aware of how that works. :tongue: Gendo thought the dummy plug would be more than sufficient for Unit 01's awakening until Yui LOLNOPE'd him at the last second, so that explanation works for me. Kaworu said it was his fault Unit 13 awakened so the Eva might have been acting out his wish for Human Instrumentality too.

Edit: Got ninja'd by Reichu's post while I was writing this up. I'll respond to that tomorrow when the time allows!
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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby DarkBluePhoenix » Thu May 03, 2018 11:15 pm

To respond to one of Reichu's earlier posts, which it's a little difficult to pull the exact quote because of how much has been written over the past few hours and me doing this on my phone... anyway I digress.

Why would rebuild toss the idea of souls in cores? If the personality data can be digitized MAGI-style, then Yui and Kyoko and the other folks (like Mari's mom) who copied their personalities should be alive and well, and not conspicuously missing. Their deaths would be otherwise pointless and serve no purpose if their souls don't need to be trapped.

As for the kids (who's names aren't Rei) are the best vessels of the Adam's souls (Kaworu included to round things out), then would there need to be any sort of core at all in the EVA? If the kids house the soul, would they not become de facto cores by replicating this purpose?
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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby Settie » Fri May 04, 2018 12:33 am

Core talk


My thought process on this is figuring out if core corrosion is something intrinsic of cores or even just based on energy "levels". So the examples cited by Reichu, is the corrosion caused by the type of core or is it the high energy event involved (activation of Wunder and an awakened Eva), or is it based by the type of core they are since the 8th angels core also caused corrosion. When cores are being manufactured they'd need to be handled in some way so would a "resting" core cause corruption, like the blue pattern Mark-4 cores, or is it simply by energy output. If it's based on energy output then i suppose a regular evas core could potentially cause corruption as well. Then again the Mark-9 for being an all-core body didn't corrode Unit-2, ugh this is just confusing and i feel like i'm going down a rabbit hole now.

View Original PostReichu wrote:I was talking about the distinction between a plain old normal synchronization test and the "deep synchronization test" that is mentioned in the screen showing Shinji's 0% score and nowhere else. This isn't the sort of minuscule detail that Shinji would even begin to care about, meaning it's there for us.


I guess it's because the way the scene is set up that it doesn't come across as just exposition for our benefit but something that makes sense in-universe. Mainly due to 2 things, there's a shot of Unit-1 evolving that has a timestamp and the glass that Shinji is behind can apparently be turned off making it seem like it's both a screen and glass.

I'd be hesitant to go there just yet. Both the dummy plug and whatever was controlling Mark.09 were accompanied by distinctive interface changes that told you loud and clear that an AI had taken over -- but no such thing was present when Eva-13 went berserk. In fact, there are no notable interface changes at all, unlike with Eva-03's possession by Angel, Eva-01 at the end of Ha, or Eva-02's Beast Modes. It's kind of strange now that I think about it...


Not very good with analogies but here goes, i'm thinking something along the lines of a modern car having different modes of driving (GT, sport, race) that affects the way the car behaves. In that sense the eva programming i'm thinking is not something that would have big noticeable UI changes but would still dictate behavior, it's why i mentioned the Mark-6 and the Mark-4s, they were or are autonomous but we don't exactly see it. We also see Unit-13s harddrives or disk drives change around before breaking the seal of lilliths chamber, programming alongside two synchronized souls. Unless of course impacts is something that is hard wired in Adams and once certain criteria are met they go on autopilot.

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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby Reichu » Fri May 04, 2018 12:45 am

@DarkBluePhoenix: In this continuity that nothing about the Magi is known, so we have no idea if similar results can be achieved without harm to the "donor". The reason I brought up the Magi as a point of reference at all is that it's not unknown for NTE to roll out ideas and concepts that weren't fully used in the original, or to otherwise subvert them; so NGE's cover story for how Evas were piloted (mentioned VERY offhandedly in episode 13) becoming the actual genuine way they're piloted in NTE fits. As for how this works, our only point of reference is Yui's experiment. Between this (which was, to no surprise at all, fatal; you just don't lower yourself into an alien organ with nothing but a wetsuit for protection and expect to live), and other moms being MIA as you mentioned, it seems that whatever exactly this process is, it may not leave anything behind. In real life transhumanist theory, there is the very real question of whether the human mind can ever be transformed into another state, like a digital one, without destroying the original in the process. NTE might be winking at that.

The hypothesis is meant as a work in progress to tie together all of the details in NTE that don't reconcile with the original series. I am somewhat hesitant to use the term "digitized personality" without any reservations whatsoever, since the label on Eva-02's core COULD be a euphemism for something non-technological. [This sort of language use was prevalent in the original NGE (not 100% sure offhand how much NTE does it) -- for example, the very flesh-and-blood S2 "engine", which gets "installed" in the very flesh-and-blood Eva Series.] But there's also the change that it's not misleading us at all. In NGE, if someone blew up their Eva, they would never be able to pilot again; but here, a mere core reconfiguration on a completely different Eva later, and the pilot is good to go. This only really makes sense if one-of-a-kind souls aren't being salvaged into the cores, as per NGE, but if instead the cores contain something that is completely replaceable. Data, unlike a soul, can be freely copied and moved around; if you lose one copy, it's no big deal provided you have a backup somewhere else. That fits with what we see here. Our Test Type Eva-01 again needs some gimmick that makes it different from the others, so here that could be the fact that it's a transitional test unit, where maybe the soul wasn't even successfully digitized, just moved from one place to another. Asuka and Mari's missing mothers (or whoever's data it is that they sync with) could potentially have been victims of a more successful but still fatal soul digitization process; and unlike Yui, they can be freely copied in the form of data, which means Eva-05 and Eva-02 getting blown up won't put Mari and Asuka out of action.

About the cores, that's a good question. The promotional poster for 1.0 includes the key term "L-01 TYPE Interconversion System CORE UNIT". Okay, so this translation is hot garbage, since it prioritizes sounding technical at the expense of making immediate sense. The kanji for "Interconversion" here also means, more understandably, "mutual/reciprocal exchange". This might bring to mind Eva synchronization and how it is a two-way feedback system. It also, for whatever reason, recalls in my mind something from the Classified Information, so perhaps despite the NGE/NTE divide it could still be semi-relevant:

Classified Information wrote:A unit called a core is used to eliminate any disparity between an Eva, the body of a god, and the soul of a human being. The soul of the pilot's mother, which is placed within the core, acts as a medium and makes piloting possible.

(Yes, it really does call the core a "unit", in English, some time before the new movies would do the exact same thing. Hmmm.)
As mentioned earlier, the core is also indicated in the first film to play a role in A.T. Field deployment. This is hinted with the Angels as well, since dialogue attributes their physical disintegration to their A.T. Fields going down, and of course this happens the moment that their cores are destroyed...

Ultimately, the closest thing to an answer is probably along the lines that the core is a feature of god-like beings that lets them do god-like things because cores look cool and no further justification is needed.* If the (non-Rei, non-Kaworu)** children actually are the Adams' souls confined within mortal shells born from mortal women, a key justification for doing so might be precisely because a Lilin body is so limited. It acts as its own limiter upon the souls' power. The children need to be granted access to their original bodies, or something very similar, before any of their power can be unleashed; and because the rebirth process has made them unaware of who they really are, their keepers can manipulate them in a way that would be difficult to impossible if they were fully independent superpowered gods. To bring this back to the core issue: since their original bodies would have contained the soul within a core, bringing the pilot's soul in contact with an Eva core through the use of the plug provides a controlled way of completing the circuit, as it were. This doesn't answer why the core is needed in the first place, but we see that the Angels have them and that they are seemingly necessary, so it is probably one of those details that you just have to take for granted.

* Then again, Q decided that it was a good idea to convolute the rather straightforward idea of a core as much as possible by introducing oxymoronic full-core beings -- core=nucleus=center, how the hell can a center be a whole, that doesn't make sense!!! -- and the concept of "core-osion", so... *HUGE SHRUG*

** Kaworu is difficult to classify, since I don't doubt that he's our fourth soul, but his appearance and ability to manifest powers without need for an Eva indicate he is somehow different from Shinji, Asuka, and Mari. I take that to mean that his origin is unique, and he sources from one of the Adams directly, perhaps not unlike Kaworu's implied origin (impregnating Adam with half-Lilin spawn via deranged transgenic experiment) in NGE.
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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby BlueBasilisk » Fri May 04, 2018 3:42 am

In the film series it's never established or even intimated that a cloned or artificially created being does not naturally possess a soul of its own, or that there's a shortage of them to go around as there was in the original series, and I've always attributed the new mechanics to that. The Evas could very easily have their own souls that they were "born" with rather than one that was implanted with them and the pilot could be synchronizing with that. Units 00, 02 and 05 have something since they were able to function independently of their pilots, and I feel that if Asuka's mother was in Unit 02 in some capacity, she or someone else in Wille would have figured it out in 14 years. But Unit 02 is only ever referred to as Unit 02 and no connection is made to Asuka's mother. Shinji is able to note something of Yui's presence in Unit 01 before they begin the operation against the 8th Angel, but the only thing that's ever noted about Unit 02 is that it smells like Asuka.

The Ayanamis provide further support of this idea. The originals only had one soul to share between them but now we've got multiples existing as unique individuals at the same time. Rei Q has a totally different personality from Pokanamai and zero continuity of memory with her. Rei II was content to die in Zeruel because there were others even though that would likely mean she'd turn to gore when it died and her soul would be lost, and her being trapped in Unit 01 presented no real problems for a successor.

Unit 01 is an interesting case because it should have a soul of it own regardless of whether or not the above is true since it was an autonomous living being before becoming an Eva, yet Yui chose to enter the core anyway to act as the "control."
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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby Reichu » Fri May 04, 2018 6:36 am

View Original PostBlueBasilisk wrote:The Ayanamis provide further support of this idea.

Do they really? Rei Q's deal is that "her soul is somewhere else" -- an in, not actually in her body. Meaning, she wasn't born with her own soul. Meaning, it's still hinted that artificial beings aren't born with souls. Else Rei Q's soul would be in Rei Q, and not "somewhere else".

With regard to multiple Reis coexisting: as well as I understand it, this is an idea only present in the preview, and not in the final product. Can we say with any certainty that it actually happened? It could still be that only one Rei is capable of being physically active at a time, only this time we have the added complication that her body and soul are in two separate places. Given we've been considering the idea of the Adams as divided but still somehow active beings, this might not be as weird as it first appears. This makes me wonder also if the weird contraption she soaks in still has any kind of personality digitizing function, as per NGE; or if (instead of / in addition to the previous) it is perhaps acting as a technological intermediary between body and soul. It IS the place where Rei Q encounters her other self...

The Evas could very easily have their own souls that they were "born" with rather than one that was implanted with them and the pilot could be synchronizing with that.

Remember that Eva-01 is able to be reconfigured for Rei's use, and Eva-02 is reconfigured for Mari's use. This is done on the fly, unlike in NGE, where reconfiguring a core is apparently not a simple process; despite knowing about Asuka's imminent replacement they don't have it done in time for Kaworu's arrival. The fact that the Evas need to be reconfigured at all implies that what they sync with is personalized: not just anything will do. Combine this personalization with stuff like Mari being able to use Eva-02 and Eva-08 after -05 is completely vaporized. It brings to mind data being copied around from place to place, very much unlike a soul.

I don't think that Eva-02 necessarily contains Asuka's mother in any capacity, but, going along with Phoenix's train of thought, I didn't think it could be ruled out either. It could still be that the missing mothers aren't a coincidence because, for whatever reason, the data of the women who reincarnated the Adams as Lilin make the best control systems. NTE's well-known "all Shinji much, much more of the time" focus change can readily explain the lack of any real attention given to what Asuka and Mari sync with. (Consider, we missed fourteen years of their lives as they fought for the future of life on Earth. "Who am I piloting?" is something of an insignificant side detail in comparison.) It could also be a reveal that's being delayed for the final film. Really hard to say right now.

Unit 01 is an interesting case because it should have a soul of it own regardless of whether or not the above is true since it was an autonomous living being before becoming an Eva, yet Yui chose to enter the core anyway to act as the "control."

I figured this was a function of the Adams being separated from their own cores, thus the one that Yui entered was an artificial blank. It not being an original is a possible reason I suggested for Mark.09's ability to take control of the Wunder away from her.

(Apologies if I glossed over a point you intended to make. I really shouldn't be posting first thing after waking up, heh.)
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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby AdamMalkovitch » Fri May 04, 2018 9:35 am

After posting a screenshot of my original post in this thread to my social media, I received an interesting comment that combines both this theory and the 'WUNDER is a weaponized 11th Angel' theory. In essence, if the WUNDER really is just #11 taken in by SEELE and given the Evangelion treatment on an immense scale, then an Adam being it's 'original master' makes a lot more sense.
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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby Arcadia's legacy » Fri May 04, 2018 11:08 am

There's just one problem with that theory. If Wunder is indeed an Angel, why hasn't it burst into a small lake of red liquid in the absence of a core?
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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby Reichu » Fri May 04, 2018 11:14 am

@Adam Malkobitch: It's pretty much impossible, going by in-film mechanics, for the Wunder to be one of the Angels. There was a thread about this last time it came up, but the gist is, first and foremost, that we're explicitly told that the 12th Angel should have been the last. (This is in response to Kaworu showing up as the 13th.) That means that the 11th was dead at that point. Defeated Angels in NTE have no bodies, as a rule. Asuka and Mari are generally in the know about things like this, and if they're using a hacked version of the 11th Angel as a form of transport, then this should have been reflected in the dialogue in some way, such that it's not being implied that the 11th no longer exists. But this is not the case. So it's probably safe to assume that they know the Wunder is NOT an Angel.

This is also important to Seele in terms of the ceremonial role the Angels' defeats play in the "covenant" and in initiating Instrumentality. Freeing the 12th Angel to wreak havoc was Gendo's idea, so presumably Seele just intended Kaworu to go down there and get rid of it in a less chaotic manner. Clear the last Angel off the plate would let HIP go forth as planned. If there was an 11th Angel still active somewhere, logically they would want to get rid of that FIRST. This of course does not happen. Eva-13 goes straight to Central Dogma with the expectation that there is, at most, only the one Angel down there left to handle. Note also that even after the 12th Angel's defeat, Seele's program within Mark.09 is not interested in destroying the Wunder; instead, the Wunder is treated as an asset they want to recover. This makes sense according to the hypothesis that the Wunder is, say, a Black Moon analogue that's been heavily modified. Of course an Adam would be its "master"* and it would treated as a valuable asset for Instrumentality. I certainly think this a much stronger explanation, since it only requires that there are things we don't yet know -- it doesn't entail undoing things we DO know. That's pretty crucial.

Since there are plenty of Evangelions that came and went between films, I don't think it's so difficult to think that a single Angel might have similarly come and gone without any lasting impact on the narrative.

* (Apropos of nothing, there is a moment in Eva2 when Adam is called the master of the White Moon. I'm not saying it's relevant, but it's going to be impossible for me to not to constantly think about that now...)

@Arcadia's legacy: The fact that the Wunder can maintain a form despite not having a core of its own basically means flat-out that it's not an Angel and doesn't follow the same rules.
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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby AdamMalkovitch » Fri May 04, 2018 11:22 am

So unless we're being severely fucked with, that means all Angels are gone, and SEELE is gone as well, so that means all that remains are NERV, WILLE, and their respective Evas. Gendo seems to be pretty much ready to initiate his plan (if it still even is Instrumentality). How he's going to do this remains a mystery, since Lilith is like super dead, not even her body remains, and we still have no clue what this Nebuchadnezzar's Key thing does, but one thing is for certain; 1.0+3.0 FINAL is going to be fucking stuffed with insane, over the top Eva vs Eva action, and I cannot wait for it.
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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby Reichu » Fri May 04, 2018 11:30 am

I'm not sure Lilith's body being a puddle is an obstacle. From a little ways upthread:

View Original PostReichu wrote:Considering [the 12th Angel's] role in the failed Third Impact, I wonder if it's just being opportunistic and attempting to reprise its efforts. A much more suitable Adam is available, and even if Lilith's body has disintegrated, it can be collected. (Recall that Eva-01 is able to absorb the Fruit of Life from the 10th Angel's liquid remains -- meaning that Lilith's LCL could similarly retain some of their vital properties post-image collapse.)

The 12th Angel was sloshing around in Lilith's LCL as it visibly got bigger, and it also took on the form of a giant Rei head -- implying, without being TOO obvious about it, that Lilith was absorbed. If so, this means that Eva-13 is now the closest thing to Lilith's body. As Eva-01's doppeldanger, this works out, since Eva-01 contains Rei, who is probably Lilith's soul. Thus the two Evas are complementary and we might expect something to come of this in the next film.
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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby ACGT-Samael » Fri May 04, 2018 12:16 pm

View Original PostReichu wrote:
The 12th Angel was sloshing around in Lilith's LCL as it visibly got bigger, and it also took on the form of a giant Rei head -- implying, without being TOO obvious about it, that Lilith was absorbed. If so, this means that Eva-13 is now the closest thing to Lilith's body. As Eva-01's doppeldanger, this works out, since Eva-01 contains Rei, who is probably Lilith's soul. Thus the two Evas are complementary and we might expect something to come of this in the next film.


So a merger of the two Evas would effectively mean a complete Lilith, fused with 1 or more Adams, which does make sense and also sounds pretty terrifying.

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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby pwhodges » Fri May 04, 2018 12:43 pm

Hmm; so Reichu reckons Eva-01 and Eva-13 are now "complementary"... And Kaworu went from being the first to the thirteenth angel...

Is there a pattern forming here, I wonder?
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Re: Mark .09, Adams Vessel, Unit 13, and the stolen AAA WUNDER

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Postby ACGT-Samael » Fri May 04, 2018 12:52 pm

View Original Postpwhodges wrote:Hmm; so Reichu reckons Eva-01 and Eva-13 are now "complementary"... And Kaworu went from being the first to the thirteenth angel...

Is there a pattern forming here, I wonder?


Consider for a moment the Japanese word used for the Angels translates as "Apostles", and in Rebuild there are 12 of them. In the Bible, Jesus is accompanied by 12 Apostles, which makes 13 with him. And Kawuro gets portrayed quite frequently as a Messianic Archetype.

None of this strikes me as coincidence.


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