The Rebuild of Evangelion and Evangelion Final Lie Somewhere In Between The Ending of the TV Series and The Movie(EoE)

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.

Moderators: Rebuild/OT Moderators, Board Staff

Forum rules
By visiting this forum, you agree to read the rules for discussion.
unitM
Ramiel
Ramiel
User avatar
Age: 33
Posts: 327
Joined: Jul 28, 2013

The Rebuild of Evangelion and Evangelion Final Lie Somewhere In Between The Ending of the TV Series and The Movie(EoE)

  •      
  •      
  • Quote

Postby unitM » Mon May 28, 2018 7:56 pm

Hi,

I thought this up while replying to a Redditor on the Evangelion board. Admittedly, this will not be a fully fleshed-out theory on account of not having the time to retrieve sufficient evidence(aka laziness). But let's see where this can go.

Neon Genesis Evangelion ended it's TV series on a polar-opposite note when compared with End of Evangelion.

1. TV Series: Shinji, within Instrumentality, accepts that life is worth living. Instrumentality offers the gift of allowing us powerful control over all of our reality. His eyes are opened through various presences in his Instrumentality and he is lifted into blue skies and out of hardships, congratulated by everyone.

2. End of Evangelion: Although Shinji realizes life is worth living in a dream-like Instrumentality state, upon rejecting Instrumentality, he is awoken to a gloomy outlook. He gets up from a beach. Not much of the setting is explained to him or to us, aside from a bloody sea and a damaged woman. What little wording she does offer is not happy or congratulatory: she merely says disgusting. This is after she leaves a trailing sentiment on his cheek, and after he chokes her, both of which are not easily identifiable as messages or instructions on how to continue living.

What similarities do both of these endings share?
-Both endings display linear emotions. In the TV edition, it's happiness. In the movie, it's confusion, not far from waking up with a serious hangover, after blacking out the night before. The setting is the morning after, wondering what the hell just happened. There is no mixture of emotions in the 2 scenes(specifically targeting the endings).
-Both endings are the expressions of others towards Shinji. In the TV edition, everyone is congratulating Shinji. In the movie, 1 person is telling Shinji he is disgusting(we assume it's directed to him). There is always an "other" there.

This gives us messages from the Evangelion Final poster:
Image

But 1 thing we can look at is this: the color schemes. The end of the TV series showed a bright blue sky. The end of the movie showed a vivid red beach.

Even beyond the poster, at the end of 3.33, there was red sand and a blue sky. In the preview for Final, again: red sand, blue sky. I don't think this is a setting that was used at all throughout the Rebuild movies - nowhere was a blue sky also shown with red sand. It was always independent of one another.

My thoughts on this:
The final Rebuild of Evangelion movie will be about Shinji's own self-acceptance. No one will give him any scripts to go by, unlike the Evangelion predecessors("Congratulations", "Disgusting", or even the guided Instrumentality sequence from the movie). The red sands represents hardships and failure but the blue skies represents freedom and the ability to move on and keep on living.


Evangelion Final will be somewhere in between the ending of the TV series and the ending of the Rebuild of Evangelion. Shinji will have to learn to accept himself without anyone saying so or otherwise, without anyone telling him that his decisions are valid or not. It is the path in between, not the yin or the yang. It is the choices Shinji will have to make himself, not reliant(or semi-reliant) on others to find out what he wants for himself.

The "I'm too lazy to do the research" part I was going to look at was also how the actors outside of Shinji performed around him. After all, Final is shown to be 1.0 + 3.0. I was writing up on how 1.11 is the "yin" in the yin & yang diagrams and 3.33 is the yang(realism and freedoms, and chaos and the realm of spirits, respectively) but I can't connect the titling sequence(You are (not) alone, You can (not) redo) to it. It gets even more confusing when you consider the happy ending of the TV series being an illusion and the bad ending of the movie being reality.

However, I did come to this:
The first Rebuild movie has more open skies than 3.33. Shinji explores the world more, in a positive manner, and it's more grounded in realism. There is less emphasis on the spiritual natures of Evangelion.
The third Rebuild movie is much darker and more related to End of Evangelion. There is extreme emphasis on spirits and the unknown. Shinji is in a state of anxiety for the whole movie and does not explore his freedoms or his world.

Could
1.0 and 3.0
Be
The TV series ending and End of Evangelion?

And the combination of the two(1.0 + 3.0) mark self-discovery and self-acceptance for Shinji?

... and what does this tell us about Rebuild 2?
2.22 explored both the natural and the supernatural parts of the Rebuild of Evangelion universe pretty equally. It started with the unknown and ended with the unknown(Shinji nearly initiating Third Impact), and then ended with the unknown again(Kaworu's lance). But it granted Shinji a lot of freedoms too. He learned to be more capable after one of his battles but also less capable after another. Is 2.22 a foreshadowing of Final, which will be a combination of 1 and 3?

... at this stage, I feel like I'm rambling and branching over a bunch of topics. But do you see where I'm coming from? Evangelion Final will be Shinji's journey to self-guided self-acceptance.

Sailor Star Dust
Kept you waiting, huh?
Kept you waiting, huh?
User avatar
Age: 38
Posts: 23063
Joined: Aug 13, 2006
Location: 私の中いる自分の心
Gender: Female

Re: The Rebuild of Evangelion and Evangelion Final Lie Somewhere In Between The Ending of the TV Series and The Movie(Eo

  •      
  •      
  • Quote

Postby Sailor Star Dust » Tue May 29, 2018 5:47 pm

My reply to your long and well thought-out post/response to Reddit is short, but I really like this idea. It'll be interesting indeed to see if this is how Shin Eva does things ^_^
~Take care of yourself, I need you~

writer
Adam
User avatar
Age: 37
Posts: 62
Joined: Aug 24, 2017
Contact:

Re: The Rebuild of Evangelion and Evangelion Final Lie Somewhere In Between The Ending of the TV Series and The Movie(Eo

  •      
  •      
  • Quote

Postby writer » Mon May 06, 2019 2:14 pm

In the case that we're looking at a plurality of realities all winding into one (3.0+1.0) we may have to also consider all the game-based side stories, as well as the Manga. Has anyone researched all of these sources?
Shinji did nothing wrong!

Caroline L.S.
Embryo
Posts: 32
Joined: Feb 23, 2019
Gender: Female

Re: The Rebuild of Evangelion and Evangelion Final Lie Somewhere In Between The Ending of the TV Series and The Movie(Eo

  •      
  •      
  • Quote

Postby Caroline L.S. » Wed May 15, 2019 6:35 am

Interesting theory. There are many speculations around the title 3.0+1.0. I read or heard something related to the titles and possible connections you mentioned. "You can(not) redo (You can(not) advance) but You are (not) alone." I just hope that the final will be better than any of these theories because some are pretty good. The idea of this ending is interesting but i dont really see it come to pass since the evangelion until you come to me kind of hints at the sequel and I just cant see Shinji figuring things out on his own since he is just bag of sawdust by the end of 3.33.

When I look at the poster, it translates to me like... "After that and the end" That being TV series and End being EOE. "Not and ANTI" Not being present in all rebuild titles so far and "Anti" hinting on the oposite, like Kaworu mentioned, fixing things. Maybe Anno being Anno gave the fans what they wanted in the (Not) titles. Like fan service and all that mess. And final will be a punch to the face for those escapists wich means the Anti.

SawItAtAge10
Gaghiel
Gaghiel
User avatar
Age: 34
Posts: 373
Joined: Feb 20, 2013
Location: Sea of LCL
Gender: Male

Re: The Rebuild of Evangelion and Evangelion Final Lie Somewhere In Between The Ending of the TV Series and The Movie(Eo

  •      
  •      
  • Quote

Postby SawItAtAge10 » Wed Jun 12, 2019 9:51 am

I like this theory as a kind of synthesis. Its strange too. The image, as simple as it is, gives me EoE vibe with the "kid drawings" shown during the Komm Susser Tod sequence...

At the same time, the image here is both desolate, they hopeful..It gives a very strange mixed feeling that's hard to pin down or fully describe.
FROM EVANGELION:
"Acts of Man are greater than acts of God!"

"I'm saying that I love you."

NOT FROM EVANGELION:
"You are excrement. You can change yourself into gold."

writer
Adam
User avatar
Age: 37
Posts: 62
Joined: Aug 24, 2017
Contact:

Re: The Rebuild of Evangelion and Evangelion Final Lie Somewhere In Between The Ending of the TV Series and The Movie(Eo

  •      
  •      
  • Quote

Postby writer » Thu Jun 27, 2019 6:30 pm

I just watched the EvaTV and EoE (thanks Netflix for giving me a reason) and have seen Rebuilds multiple times. We are lead to believe that 25 and 26 are represented with more details in EoE, this confirmed even more by a watch through of Concurrency. I am starting to believe that Rebuild happens during EvaTV (25/26) and EoE, and that 3.0 is a continuation set in a future after EoE. It seems that even EoE is quite convoluted when you take into account all the supplemental information about the series as well as the events of Rebuild. I have long thought that the artifacts (red sea, bloodstain on the moon, Kaworu's role) all lead to Rebuild being a post-EoE event, but now I am thinking that the first 2 Rebuild films may have just been a part of instrumentality; a version of Shinji that saves the day, acts as a hero, doesn't back away as easily from challenges, and assist in the rebuilding, or reformation of, his counterparts from pre-3I.

As a point of reference, I'd first like to say that I believe the "Rebuild" term is meant to constitute a human being who survived through instrumentality; a person that was able to recombine themselves from the LCL ocean. The Asuka, Misato, Gendo, et. all that we see in Rebuild 3.0 were recombined from the LCL sea. That is why they have memory of Shinji and his actions during 3I. Their anger is accelerated to include the events of N2I as well since being "real" or simply a product of Shinji's imagination is no different for them.

There is no doubt that Rebuild Shinji has a much higher mental fortitude than EvaTV or EoE Shinji, mainly evidenced by his gusto to take risks and reach for what he wants, almost as if he knows what he's meant to do to change the events of EvaTV. By saving Rei through N2I, Shinji averts 3I and saves Rei II, or at least his mental projection of Rei II. He acts like a post 25-26 Shinji, or at least one that has been embedded with the teachings. If 25 and 26 are a watered down version of EoE (I personally think it may be that EoE is an expansion on the concepts and a real-world scenario, but that the events happened both in-tandem and out of sync), then Rebuild 1 and 2 are simply reflections of Shinji's mind as he reconciles the world and the events that lead up to and occurred during 3I from within Eva 01.

Rebuild purposefully pushes N3I into existence with enough time for Kaworu to stop it, leaving the Earth torn but humanity intact. This do es not explain how Shinji winds up in space within Eva 01, nor does it explain how the NERV facility is destroyed in a similar fashion to the way Shinji destroyed his sandcastle pyramid in EoE. In fact, during EoE, we see Shinji leave Eva 01 and reclaim his position in the world next to Asuka; an Asuka we now know as Shinkinami. This is evidence that the Shinji we see on the beach at the end of EoE is the same as a rebuilt Asuka, and that 1.0 and 2.0 occur during and after 3I as a reflected memory as Shinji attempts to reclaim the world and save it from Instrumentality. The Shinji which remains within the confines of Eva 01 is the part that creates Rebuild 1.0 and 2.0, whereas the Shinji that returns to the beach in 3.0 is a so-far unseen entity.

When we first see Shinji in 3.0, he is immediately cemented as a re-creation of the 2nd Children divined by Katsuragi and Akagi. They even mention how he matches the profile of the 2nd Children, though he has no memory of anything outside of Rebuild. It is this that leads me to believe that Rebuild is the reality as remembered by a Shinji left within the Eva after 3I, the "rebuilt" Shinji lost somewhere within the events leading up to 3.0 after EoE. The Shinji left within Eva 01 does not remember the events of 3I, and in-fact rebuilds the events leading up to 3I through his 13 years confined within Eva 01.

I hope that the 3.0+1.0 title will lead us to that revelation, as well to a definitive understanding of what happened to the rebuilt Shinji, and what our new Shinji Ikari must do to reclaim the true characters from EvaTV (not their counterparts which are all post 3I recreations) and reset 3I from destroying the Earth. In this, the end becomes the beginning of a new possibility for all characters; a world without the threat of destruction as seen in EvaTV.
Shinji did nothing wrong!

A Renegade Deserter
Adam
User avatar
Posts: 61
Joined: Sep 04, 2020
Location: Back from exile to infiltrate and combat my mortal enemy
Gender: Male

Re: The Rebuild of Evangelion and Evangelion Final Lie Somewhere In Between The Ending of the TV Series and The Movie(Eo

  •      
  •      
  • Quote

Postby A Renegade Deserter » Sun Aug 15, 2021 12:56 am

I think now that 3.0+1.0 along with the rest of Rebuild is on Amazon Pirme, what's thematized in this thread can be seen as valid in regards to what is happening in 3.0+1.0 itself.
"To kill for yourself is murder. To kill for your government is heroic. To kill for entertainment is harmless."
- Loading Screen, Spec Ops: The Line

"There is no difference between what is right and what is necessary."
- Loading Screen, Spec Ops: The Line

"We cannot escape anguish. It is what we are."
- Loading Screen, Spec Ops: The Line

"Collateral damage can be justified, if the gain outweighs the cost."
- Loading Screen, Spec Ops: The Line

"Freedom is what you do with what's been done to you."
- Loading Screen, Spec Ops: The Line


Return to “Rebuild of Evangelion Discussion”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 2 guests