Around the middle of episode 5 Shinji tries not to touch Rei as she gets her glasses back but ends up on top of her.



After Rei asks "what is it?" Shinji stammers about her new security card. Rei walks off to catch the train to headquarters and arrives at one of the gates -



Rei tries to use her old card to open the gate but it doesn't work - even though Shinji had just told her about her new card. Was Rei even listening to what Shinji said after she asked "what is it?" or did she purposefully ignore him because he was all over the shop in his speech and making the situation worse? - if it's the latter then that implies Rei did care about being in that uncomfortable situation (and just wanted to get away as soon as possible) when nearly everyone uses that scene as proof that she doesn't care about her personal space.

Rei snatches her new card off Shinji - is Rei just being her usual unfriendly self or is she saying to Shinji "why couldn't you have just given me the card like this in the first place?!"

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At the end of episode 5 Rei watches Shinji get sent out in EVA-01 (why are we shown this?) right into Ramiel's particle beam.



Then in episode 6 while Shinji is recovering she waits next to him with Gendo's glasses on her lap.



- there's a shot of Shinji through Gendo's glasses after this. Is this telling the audience that Rei is already doubting Gendo when he sends his own son out to get fried or something else?

I think it's more showing the Gendou Ikari is too the fore In Rei's mind at the time. she does think of the elder Ikari a great deal, like. You see the way she practically idolises him when she jogs around th armour of Unit 00 in Ep, 5, and how she's talking to the Commander with what could almost be a smile on her face...

Perhaps the glasses could be a sign in her faith in the Commander, that he had made the right decisions, and that he favours her.

It looked to me like she was simply not bothering with Shinji's incoherent stuttering. She certainly didn't seem uncomfortable, seeing how she smiled at the glasses while putting them away. Glasses > Shinji.

Something was definitely distracting her. You gotta be pretty distracted to not hear a stupid 14 year old boy who just grabbed your boob.

Or may she was thinking "if I don't respond to this groper, maybe he'll go away. I wish he'd run away. I wish he'd runaway. I wish he'd runaway."

I think the "What?" meant, "What are you staring at me for?" not "What did you come here for?" I think it was more an acknowledgment of his gaze and less of an inquiry. Like JimmyWolk said, the glasses were more important than Shinji. Rei seemed to view him as just some harmless guy who was touching her things, and she decided to stop that. Once that was taken care of, he returned to the unimportant state. Saying, "What" was probably a way of saying "I notice you're still here, and I see no logical reason for that. Just thought I'd bring that to your attention."

I honestly don't know why Rei snatched the card away from Shinji. She seems too emotionless (towards Shinji, anyway) to have been annoyed, and she didn't seem to be in enough of a hurry to need it that quickly either.

Rei watching Unit 1 launch may have just been an interest in all things Eva, masked by her typical emotionless state. I know I'd enjoy seeing one of those things get sent out to fight. Again, I don't think there's enough of a connection between Rei and Shinji at this point for her to feel sorry or worried for him.

I don't know what to think about the second glasses scene either. As a rule, I try not to read too far into things, but I can't come up with a plausible explanation off the top of my head without doing so.

Well, going by what Anno told Hayashibara, it's not that Rei doesn't have emotions but doesn't know what emotions are. Notice that she's visibly annoyed when Asuka tries to block the light in Episode 09. She'd probably have been too disturbed (Angry? Disgusted? Both?) after that incident to really pay attention to what Shinji was saying.

I suppose she was still somewhat disgusted, or annoyed, to see Shinji still around. Notice that instead of asking why he's so upset about his dad, she goes straight to slapping him. (Although she probably feels strongly enough about Gendo that she'd have slapped him whatever her feelings for Shinji were)

Why does Rei stare at him? She's probably concerned about him but doesn't really know it. Someone who doesn't know what emotions are would barely be able to understand her own behavior.

I think the look she gives Unit 01 is of curiosity. She may be wondering if he is scared too.

I'm still thinking about why she has the glasses after the contact experiment. To her, the glasses are like a reminder of Gendo's need for her and that she has worth enough to him to fry his hands. Maybe she feels so compelled to please Gendo that she will go talk to the boy who groped her to help foward Gendo's plans even though she probably feels contempt for him at the moment? I'm not sure, it's a thought.

UrsusArctos wrote:Well, going by what Anno told Hayashibara, it's not that Rei doesn't have emotions but doesn't know what emotions are. Notice that she's visibly annoyed when Asuka tries to block the light in Episode 09.

I actually didn't get that impression at all. It looked more like she took it in stride. "Oh, there's something blocking my light. I guess I'll just move so that it's not blocking my light anymore. Okay, there it goes again. Guess I'll see what the obstruction is." I didn't see annoyance either of the times I watched that episode.

Gamer_2k4 wrote:I actually didn't get that impression at all. It looked more like she took it in stride. "Oh, there's something blocking my light. I guess I'll just move so that it's not blocking my light anymore. Okay, there it goes again. Guess I'll see what the obstruction is." I didn't see annoyance either of the times I watched that episode.

When Asuka blocked the light, there's a clear frown on Rei's face.

I don't think any true feelings from Rei towards Shinji happened until the "Why don't you just smile?" scene.

My thoughts exactly. ^-^

Rei's face is usually always so emotionless enough to not be able to depict what she's really feeling.

Sachi_13 wrote:When Asuka blocked the light, there's a clear frown on Rei's face.

No more than before:


If anything, she's already frowning before Asuka gets there. The second image only looks different because it's at a slightly different angle. And after Asuka blocks the light the second time, her eyebrows raise slightly, but that can be interpreted as questioning, as in, "Why is the shadow still there?" Sure, it could be considered a frown, but I don't think it has to be one. (It's also worth noting that when you look up, your eyebrows raise by themselves.)

She looks somewhat annoyed. And she's looking in Asuka's direction, so maybe she already knew it was her. She's always had a particular dislike for Asuka, probably since the day she arrived.

Evangelion__x wrote:She looks somewhat annoyed. And she's looking in Asuka's direction, so maybe she already knew it was her. She's always had a particular dislike for Asuka, probably since the day she arrived.

The first screenshot was before Asuka shows up. Or are you trying to say that Rei just always looks annoyed?

I had really assumed that Rei just wasn't paying attention to Shinji not to be rude or to actively ignore him, but that she was paying much more attention to getting those glasses taken care of. Shinji's not really that worth it compared to them.

Ornette wrote:The first screenshot was before Asuka shows up. Or are you trying to say that Rei just always looks annoyed?

I know, I'm referring to the second and third screenshot. I'm not saying that Rei always looks annoyed.

Gamer_2k4 wrote:

Sachi_13 wrote:When Asuka blocked the light, there's a clear frown on Rei's face.

No more than before:

Don't you ever find yourself sorta frowning while reading a book. Rei reads a lot, it seems, so she'd be pretty into whatever she's reading. If you're reading a book you like, you don't give lazy eyes to it. You reading intently. Which can sometimes make an involuntary "frown" looking gaze. Bad example.

The frown torwards Asuka was an actual frown. I'd be pretty annoyed too if someone was intentionally blocking my light.

Sachi_13 wrote:Don't you ever find yourself sorta frowning while reading a book. Rei reads a lot, it seems, so she'd be pretty into whatever she's reading. If you're reading a book you like, you don't give lazy eyes to it. You reading intently. Which can sometimes make an involuntary "frown" looking gaze. Bad example.

The frown torwards Asuka was an actual frown. I'd be pretty annoyed too if someone was intentionally blocking my light.

Well sure, so would I, but what we've seen so far is that Rei doesn't show emotions about little things like that. I'm sure I frown when reading, but when someone blocks my light, I look up in curiosity or surprise, instead of just moving the book and glancing in the direction of the problem if it persists.

IMO, the initial frown isn't a bad example, as it just goes to show that Rei's expression really doesn't change throughout the scene. "Okay, that's a reading frown. Now she's looking up, so that's an annoyance frown. Alright, back to the reading frown." What?

Remember when I said that it was worth noting that eyebrows raise involuntarily? It's also worth noting that when Rei went back to her book, they dropped back down, indicating that either the annoyance only lasted as long as she was looking at Asuka, or that that was no annoyance, and the altered expression was simply the result of eye motion.

Zuggy wrote:Rei tries to use her old card to open the gate but it doesn't work - even though Shinji had just told her about her new card.

What we have here is a failure to communicate... I don't think Rei was trying to get out of an uncomfortable or embarrassing situation, rather her leaving was just part of her routine. As for not hearing him, he wasn't really making himself very clear, Rei probably disregarded what he said because he was unable to form it into a coherent sentence. The shortness with Shinji, snatching the card, I would chalk up to irritation with him over the glasses, although, its possible she's frustrated with him for being fairly annoying and bothersome that entire morning.

I always kinda had the feeling that early on Rei was annoyed by Shinji's existance, mostly because he was piloting EVA 01 instead of her. It's not an Asuka type situation by any means, but rather that he's getting in the way of her fulfilling her purpose. Piloting EVA to kill angels is part 1 of that mission statement after all, and at this point Rei is practically nonexistant without her purpose.

Plus there's the thought that maybe she was kinda looking forward to dying and he keeps going out of his way to screw that plan up for her.

NemZ wrote:I always kinda had the feeling that early on Rei was annoyed by Shinji's existance, mostly because he was piloting EVA 01 instead of her. It's not an Asuka type situation by any means, but rather that he's getting in the way of her fulfilling her purpose. Piloting EVA to kill angels is part 1 of that mission statement after all, and at this point Rei is practically nonexistant without her purpose.

Killing the Angels is not her purpose, though. The only reason she exists is because of Gendo's plans with her to reunite with Yui.