Evangelion 3.0 Speculation [1]

[Azathoth]

That she has to at least attempt to reach out.

She already did that in 2.xx, too, albeit in such a half-assed manner that it's difficult to care.

And, most likely this epiphany will be in the battle with the black space gods.

Naturally.

[driftking18594]

I'm wondering if there's going to be more focus on Ritsuko on 3.0. Rebuild!Ritsuko seems a lot more colder than NGE!Ritsuko, so maybe 3.0 could show us why that's the case.

[Jornophelanthas]

I'm wondering if there's going to be more focus on Ritsuko on 3.0. Rebuild!Ritsuko seems a lot more colder than NGE!Ritsuko, so maybe 3.0 could show us why that's the case.

I have two thoughts about this, both pure speculation.

1. Rebuild-Ritsuko has no sotryline of her own, will be given no character development, and is little more than an extra. So far, we have been given no additional information about her, i.e. no backstory, no clues about whether Naoko's story from NGE happened in Rebuild, and no clues that she is in a relationship with Gendo. Even if these things are all true in Rebuild after all, it still remains to be seen whether they will be relevant to the main plot at all.

2. Rebuild-Ritsuko is the total opposite of her NGE counterpart: she is a SEELE infiltrant, sent to keep tabs on Gendo and report any suspicious behaviour to them. In this case, she is not the woman scorned by Gendo, but rather a seductress who uses sexual means to get at his hidden agenda, with the intent to betray him. The only argument I can offer in favour of this theory is that it would still enable her to have the role of saboteur in NERV at some later point in the story, while being a near-complete mirror-image reversal of her NGE character motivation, without being a different character.

(A similar mirror-image reversal as Asuka giving up on Shinji, Misato refusing to rekindle her relationship with Kaji, Rei not dying in the destruction of Unit-00, and Shinji being the driving force behind Unit-01's god mode berserk.)

[Brainman]

^
I'm pretty sick of "twists." I'd be more interested in the next movies behaving as independent stories that lack a prior model to compare to. That's what I think is sticking in the gears too often in these movies so far. Every dissection of a scene kinda sounds the same. "Well, in THIS scene, such-n-such happens instead of the other thing happening."

I think it would be a more admirable challenge to strike out in directions where you couldn't do that. The movies as a cohesive whole will benefit more because there will be less of a temptation to sort out the two stories relative to each other. They could actually exist as their own movies.

Watching 2.0 felt like the movie was obnoxiously jabbing me in the ribs with its elbow saying "Did ya see that? Eh? Eh? Bet ya didn't see that coming did ya?" I kind of wish 3.0 and Final will tone down on that. Let it be its own thing.

[Warren Peace]

I'm pretty sick of "twists." I'd be more interested in the next movies behaving as independent stories that lack a prior model to compare to. That's what I think is sticking in the gears too often in these movies so far. Every dissection of a scene kinda sounds the same. "Well, in THIS scene, such-n-such happens instead of the other thing happening."

I can only think of one instance of this: Rei blocking Asuka's slap in the elevator. Otherwise, if scenes are repeated, they tend to stick pretty close to the original. I guess you could count Asuka piloting Unit-03 too, though that seems like a bigger deal than simply "such-n-such happens instead of the other thing happening." But if you do count it, that's two instances.

[Azathoth]

I can only think of one instance of this

off the top of my head: Unit 01 does not raise her hand to protect Shinji, Asuka gets in bed with Shinji, Shinji and Kaji at melon patch. All the same, all changed to make obvious some new point of story. And yeah, it's getting pretty old.

[Brainman]

Well it's also kind of funny that big ending - Shinji turning into Ultraman instead of Unit 01 eating Zeruel bit isn't counted as a "twist" either, but never mind. In either case, the issue I have with the twist approach is that it makes me more aware that this stuff is written by some people in a room. It's like like seeing the strings on a puppet. So when you see something and it's like "ooh wait, Asuka is piloting unit 03?" it feels less organic to me because I can more vividly imagine that being pitched by some guy in a brainstorming session.

But what I find intriguing in 3.0 is the opportunity to be in the void so to speak. There's latitude to go into things that have no NGE equivalent. So the possibilities are more vast. Like we've gone past the obligatory eva-gone-rogue story and Rei sacrifice combined with Shinji absorption thing. We can pretty much go anywhere from here.

[Hyper Shinchan]

But what I find intriguing in 3.0 is the opportunity to be in the void so to speak.

It's not like they'll draw ideas from the void though. In the end it'll always be written by people in a room and people are influenced by stuff that they've seen/done before.

[deeRez]

off the top of my head: Unit 01 does not raise her hand to protect Shinji, Asuka gets in bed with Shinji, Shinji and Kaji at melon patch. All the same, all changed to make obvious some new point of story. And yeah, it's getting pretty old.

Unit 01 not raising her hand, might be Anno trying to downplay Shinji being "special" or "the chosen one." Furthermore, Ritsuko's reaction to it moving in Eva-TV is uncalled for because a few episodes later, we're told that she's seen Unit 00 move on its own with the pilot ejected (which happened before Shinji's arrival). So it also doubles as a plot error.

That Asuka bed scene revealed a lot about the characters in a quick go. Due to character development limits in a movie, expect a lot of these scenes.

Though, I don't mind it because, I see Eva 1.0 and Eva 2.0 as introductions. You slowly phase out the old with the new, you can't do it abruptly.

Eva 3.0 and Eva 4.0 are when the real story begins. Can't wait to see what they decide to do.

Like we've gone past the obligatory eva-gone-rogue story and Rei sacrifice combined with Shinji absorption thing. We can pretty much go anywhere from here.

Yup.

[Brainman]

It's not like they'll draw ideas from the void though. In the end it'll always be written by people in a room and people are influenced by stuff that they've seen/done before.

Well right, obviously. But it'll be less blatant if the ideas are genuinely new and not some subversion or mirroring of whatever. By that point I'll be more immersed in what's going on in the story than tying something back to another scene for some sort of context.

Edit:

Though, I don't mind it because, I see Eva 1.0 and Eva 2.0 as introductions. You slowly phase out the old with the new, you can't do it abruptly.

Eva 3.0 and Eva 4.0 are when the real story begins. Can't wait to see what they decide to do.

This is what I'm hoping.

...Although they could have done that from the get-go. Just saying.

[Warren Peace]

Well it's also kind of funny that big ending - Shinji turning into Ultraman instead of Unit 01 eating Zeruel bit isn't counted as a "twist" either, but never mind. In either case, the issue I have with the twist approach is that it makes me more aware that this stuff is written by some people in a room. It's like like seeing the strings on a puppet. So when you see something and it's like "ooh wait, Asuka is piloting unit 03?" it feels less organic to me because I can more vividly imagine that being pitched by some guy in a brainstorming session.

But what I find intriguing in 3.0 is the opportunity to be in the void so to speak. There's latitude to go into things that have no NGE equivalent. So the possibilities are more vast. Like we've gone past the obligatory eva-gone-rogue story and Rei sacrifice combined with Shinji absorption thing. We can pretty much go anywhere from here.

I don't think that's a fair criticism -- this is a remake, so chances are things that happen are going to remind you of things that happened before. You can't fault it for interacting and commenting on the original story. Remaking Eva means you have to play with people's expectations a bit. Throw some curve balls. If you're going to make everything unrecognizable, there's no reason to base it on NGE at all.

Anno either changes things too much or not enough. Dude can't win!

Edit: What Shinchan said. What's wrong with subversion? Subversion rules!

[Brainman]

I don't think that's a fair criticism -- this is a remake, so chances are things that happen are going to remind you of things that happened before. You can't fault it for interacting and commenting on the original story. Remaking Eva means you have to play with people's expectations a bit. Throw some curve balls. If you're going to make everything unrecognizable, there's no reason to base it on NGE at all.

Anno either changes things too much or not enough. Dude can't win!

Edit: What Shinchan said. What's wrong with subversion? Subversion rules!

That's getting dangerously close to a fundamental problem I have with the rebuild idea in general (I don't believe the world really needed some alternative Eva). I mean, have you ever tried to explain to someone who's only casually into Eva what Rebuild is? Every time I do it I just seem to confuse them. Is it a remake? I honestly don't know.

For me it's still stuck in an uncanny valley as far as what it's supposed to be. It's "close enough" but not really. For some people I guess that's more comfortable. But I guess it's also true that in almost every instance where something was different, it was different in a way that I don't prefer. So maybe I'm just too biased. But even so, I don't see Rebuild doing enough to make me think of it as more than vestigial to the original, when it could be its own creature entirely.

To put it another way, it's essential to watch the original to get the most out of Rebuild, but it's completely unnecessary to watch Rebuild after seeing the original. It's supplementary, but it has the opportunity to be more than that.

[Hyper Shinchan]

I don't think that's a fair criticism -- this is a remake, so chances are things that happen are going to remind you of things that happened before.

Yeah, even other Anno works which aren't directly related to Evangelion can remind us of it, like Shiki-jitsu's fucking ending, it's even more expectable from a "remake" or whatever NME is.

Anno either changes things too much or not enough. Dude can't win!

I have this idea from a long time, it's unavoidable that some people would end up whining, I just hope that they'd be different people.

[Azathoth]

Unit 01 not raising her hand, might be Anno trying to downplay Shinji being "special" or "the chosen one."

Not really; the point of the scene is to establish that Gendou's plot revolves around Shinji having a relationship with Rei (and later using that to awaken Yui), as opposed to simply putting Shinji in line of fire (and using that to force Yui's hand). If you notice, in ep01 Gendou smiles triumphantly when Unit 01 shields Shinji. Although that occurrence is missing from 1.xx, the shot of Gendou smiling is still there; it's just right after Shinji picks up Rei.

That Asuka bed scene revealed a lot about the characters in a quick go.

Not nearly as much as the original did, in my opinion, but my point wasn't to compare their relative effects. The point is they've repeatedly used this trick ("Let's do the same scene as in the show but get this, it's different") with varying effectiveness, and it's getting old for me.

[TheHentaiChrist]

I think a lot of the complaints about how it's just 'twists' is formed from watching the films with old eyes.

As I understand it, their goal was for the first film to be essentially the same thing (it was, albeit truncated) and for the second to shift. I think it did, but it was very slow to happen. You watch the whole movie thinking, 'damn, this is all pretty much the same thing too', but what's less apparent is the changes are more critical to the plot. You can say, 'Okay, Asuka was in Unit-03? So what, that's almost anti-climactic'. Problem with that is, what happens next? You're just sort of assuming 'nothing' because Toji was pretty much discarded after that. But that can't be the case with Asuka and there is pretty likely to be some consequences down the road. The differences we've seen may only appear to be skin deep, but how much Evangelion have you seen that was ever nothing more than skin deep?

So, anyway, you get to the end of the movie and some really big different things happen and the movie ends with Shinji initiating Third effing Impact. That's not a twist anymore. That's important. Roll credits. Then, as an exclamation point at the end, Kaworu introduces himself not by song but my lancing Shinji.

Personally, I neither think of this as a sequel nor a remake. Think back to the original series. 'This is the Shinji Ikari that exists in your mind. This is the Shinji Ikari that exists in Misato Katsuragi's mind. Both are different Shinji Ikari's and neither can be called the true Shinji Ikari.' It's the same thing. This is the Evangelion that exists in Anno's mind, 10 years later.

My favorite thing about Evangelion is that the Universe is so interpretative and insubstantial. Evangelion is just being insubstantial for you but you're just nostalgiaing so hard, you're missing it! :3

(Sorry for being that new guy that interrupts a conversation with a really long post.)

I guess my only real complaint, so far, is the lack of Shinji/Asuka development. The movies have focused so hard on Rei and Shinji that I'm not sure how they're going to come back from it. I'm sure they will and it will be amazing but... still, I always describe Evangelion as a love story so tragic it takes the entire world down with it. It better be! Shinji + Asuka, damnit! D: [/impassionedyelling]

[Jornophelanthas]

My favorite thing about Evangelion is that the Universe is so interpretative and insubstantial. Evangelion is just being insubstantial for you but you're just nostalgiaing so hard, you're missing it! :3

I believe this is the core point for understanding Evangelion. If you believe you can only make sense of something if you're being told in advance what it is, you are missing the point.

Unable to make sense of Rebuild of Evangelion because you don't know if it's a sequel, a remake, an alternate universe, or a parallel universe that will somehow connect to NGE? Well, don't count on Anno ever telling you that. You are intentionally left to your own devices to craft your interpretation of it.
And so it is with the characters and their personalities. Who is Shinji? Is he who he believes himself to be? Is he how others perceive him? Which others? Misato? Rei? Asuka? Gendo? Does Unit-01 count as an other? Or is he nobody yet, and does he become who he believes himself to be by acting on his own self-image?
The whole point of Evangelion is that the main characters cannot define themselves, because they have no firm, static, clear and distinct frame of reference to define themselves against. We as the viewers don't have such a frame of reference for the characters either.
And the great big moral of the story is that we, the viewers, don't have such an unshakably objective frame of reference for ourselves either.

----

I guess my only real complaint, so far, is the lack of Shinji/Asuka development. The movies have focused so hard on Rei and Shinji that I'm not sure how they're going to come back from it. I'm sure they will and it will be amazing but... still, I always describe Evangelion as a love story so tragic it takes the entire world down with it. It better be! Shinji + Asuka, damnit! D: [/impassionedyelling]

I disagree. Evangelion is not a love story at heart and has never been that. Evangelion is about coming of age, identity construction, and reaching out to others. And yes, love, sex and romance are a part of that, but not the single most important part.
Other themes, which are just as important include parental influence, abandonment, indecisiveness, responsibility, guilt, shame, friendship, empathy, making sense of one's own emotions, and (perhaps most prominently - because of the Angels) tragic conflict.

[TheHentaiChrist]

But it's Shinji's relationship with Asuka, at least in the Series and EoE, that was used as the critical factor and the trigger for Instrumentality.

It was Asuka who he went to, even being comatose and pleaded with. It was Asuka who's death and dismemberment served to initiate SEELE's instrumentality. And it was Asuka who he turned to, in his own mind, and begged for consolation and, when denied, he released and throttled because it was Asuka who Shinji saw as being the one who, above all others, was instrumental to himself.

It is not the only important thing, but it is that relationship that was chosen to define Instrumentality. I think that's significant.

At least, that is the Evangelion that exists within my mind. At it's heart, what we see is a reflection of ourselves so what I see is a love story. :3

Now, maybe that's not as big a draw to others as it is to me, but I do think the Rebuild would really lose something incredibly important without Shinji + Asuka. (I'm not off-topic! I swear!)

[Hyper Shinchan]

But it's Shinji's relationship with Asuka, at least in the Series and EoE, that was used as the critical factor and the trigger for Instrumentality.

His "relation" with Asuka was just one of the triggers, for example discovering Rei's identity and killing Kaworu also had a heavy impact on Shinji's psyche.

It was Asuka who he went to, even being comatose and pleaded with. It was Asuka who's death and dismemberment served to initiate SEELE's instrumentality. And it was Asuka who he turned to, in his own mind, and begged for consolation and, when denied, he released and throttled because it was Asuka who Shinji saw as being the one who, above all others, was instrumental to himself.

Like Asuka herself said he was simply scared of everyone else, he didn't have any other option.

[Brainman]

Yall need to abandon 'ship', if'n you know what I mean. Or else this can of worms is going to get out of hand (we all know it will). Not that I'm adverse to the subject or anything (I will say that without EoE and its implications there wouldn't be as many of us hardcore Asukafans, and I'll just leave it at that).

To get a different tangent going, what about Keel? From what I remember we haven't actually seen him (or any other Seele member) yet. What if Seele isn't the same Seele we remember from NGE? I could see there being something weird being developed there.

[Hyper Shinchan]

Yall need to abandon 'ship', if'n you know what I mean.

Easier said than done, unfortunately.

To get a different tangent going, what about Keel? From what I remember we haven't actually seen him (or any other Seele member) yet. What if Seele isn't the same Seele we remember from NGE? I could see there being something weird being developed there.

It may be, effectively their visual disappearance is one of those small changes that could hide a significant departure from NGE. BTW is there still a "Committee" or are they acting directly in NME? I think that I've not noticed it or at least I can't remember it.