Arch-Fiend Yui / Inevitability of 3I

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Arch-Fiend Yui / Inevitability of 3I

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Postby DatDude » Wed Jun 01, 2005 6:07 pm

Split from here at DD's request. -Reichu

Carl Horn wrote:I think, a.) even if Gendo Rokubungi thinks he loves Yui, it in no way excuses what he does or tries to do to everyone else, and b.) even if Yui Ikari thinks she loves Shinji, it in no way excuses what she does or tries to do to everyone else. A God complex is no better when a mother has it than when a father has it.


This matches my point of view when it comes to Gendo, but can you enlightn me on how Yui has a god complex? Seeing as we se so little of her directly in the show its been hard for be to pin her down character wise ( most of what we see of her is in the form of flashbacks from people with deep feelings of affection for her).
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Postby Reichu » Thu Jun 02, 2005 2:55 am

Yui becomes a god and lives forever. Nuff said.

Gendo is a very silly man. His wife was right in front of his eyes all those years and he didn't care to notice. :P
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Postby ObsessiveMathsFreak » Thu Jun 02, 2005 3:47 am

Reichu wrote:Gendo is a very silly man. His wife was right in front of his eyes all those years and he didn't care to notice. :P

Well, some people lose the old flame when their spouse puts on a few million extra pounds later in the marraige.
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Postby Dave » Thu Jun 02, 2005 1:57 pm

Reichu wrote:Gendo is a very silly man. His wife was right in front of his eyes all those years and he didn't care to notice. :P


Reichu, I think you're about the only person who views Yui's situation as an improvement rather than a living nightmare.
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Postby Carl Horn » Thu Jun 02, 2005 3:05 pm

Dave wrote:
Reichu wrote:Gendo is a very silly man. His wife was right in front of his eyes all those years and he didn't care to notice. :P


Reichu, I think you're about the only person who views Yui's situation as an improvement rather than a living nightmare.


I know I tend to harp on this, but from the perspective of relatively normal human beings such as Misato and Kaji, Gendo and Yui are megalomaniacal psychopaths, determined to reveal humanity's "true nature" and "destiny" regardless of the personal costs to actual humans. With what Yui knows and believes, she may actually prefer to wear the face and the body of Eva-01. It's her superior, tranfigured self, just as Michael Jackson prefers what he looks like now to the perfectly nice-looking guy he was when he was a kid.

With all that talk about what a great mommy Yui is, I point out that Shinji started off EVA a sullen but presentable boy, and ended it a blank-eyed psycho trying to strangle someone. Real good job there, O wise mother goddess. Don't listen to that claptrap about future happiness she spouts to Rei and Kaworu--I say, look at the results in Shinji.

The gap between the two scenes is, I believe, emblematic of the ideologue who can see utopias but not the actual people who have to live inside their plans. It's all for your own good, Shinji...Yui, like Gendo, sees something very different when they look at human beings--but whatever it is, it sure isn't what you'd call humanity. At least Gendo had the honesty to admit that they had brought their son into hell (a hell in large part of their own creation).

--C.

P.S. Shit! Now I can't get "P.Y.T." out of my head!

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Postby DatDude » Thu Jun 02, 2005 3:22 pm

Yui's real intentions in the show are the hardest to pin down because as important as she is we see so little of her directly. Mainly we get flash backs from people in one way or another in love with her.

Other then her last word to Shinji, and a brief ( IMHO tained flashback ) we get nothing on what SHE had in mind to do.
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Postby Shin-seiki » Thu Jun 02, 2005 4:08 pm

You gotta wonder about what she had in mind when she proclaimed that she was showing her child "the bright future" as she was about to knowingly and intentionally shed her human form in favor of that of the demon/god Shogouki...

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Postby DatDude » Thu Jun 02, 2005 4:49 pm

Two things how do you know it was her intention? I remember his talk with Fuyutsuki aluded to somthing, but I don't trust any of the flashbacks with Yui in them. The people that have them ( flashbeacks of Yui ) have strong feelings for her, and I think they cloud the memory.

Also, do we ever get anything close to hard proof to the theory that Shinji knew on some level that Yui was in the eva and thats why it could save him by going beserk? I know the only time/s we see Unit-2 go crazy are when Shinjis in their with Asuka, and in EoE after Asuka realizes her mothers in the eva.

If we had somthing on this it would make Yui's actions a bit more redeamable. She was one of the evas main creators if anyone knew they'd need a child/mothers sole combo to make the thing work it be her, and if Shinji/herself meet the standards she'd be a hypocrit if she didn't do it. If this was the case it would make sence that she'd bring Shinji to that lab so as hard as it would be to see her " die " he'd on some level always know she was in the eva, and that knowledge could save him in battle.

This of course is just a crack pot theory and just my guss.
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Postby Reichu » Thu Jun 02, 2005 5:00 pm

Dave wrote:Reichu, I think you're about the only person who views Yui's situation as an improvement rather than a living nightmare.


I never said it wasn't a nightmare, did I?

Carl Horn wrote:I know I tend to harp on this, but from the perspective of relatively normal human beings such as Misato and Kaji, Gendo and Yui are megalomaniacal psychopaths, determined to reveal humanity's "true nature" and "destiny" regardless of the personal costs to actual humans. With what Yui knows and believes, she may actually prefer to wear the face and the body of Eva-01. It's her superior, tranfigured self, just as Michael Jackson prefers what he looks like now to the perfectly nice-looking guy he was when he was a kid.


To my chagrin, apparently the face and body of EVA-01 are not what Yui is ultimately opting for, if that head of white hair at the end of #26' is telling us anything. Excuse me while I go placate my soul with fanfic therapy.

With all that talk about what a great mommy Yui is, I point out that Shinji started off EVA a sullen but presentable boy, and ended it a blank-eyed psycho trying to strangle someone. Real good job there, O wise mother goddess. Don't listen to that claptrap about future happiness she spouts to Rei and Kaworu--I say, look at the results in Shinji.


Yui is certainly mysterious, but I've always viewed her as being too down-to-Earth to be the arch-villainous you see her as. Whatever her exact motives, I think she should be granted some credit for being the very force that puts the lid on Instrumentality and any possibility of it ever happening on Earth again. Of course, Instrumentality being initiated wasn't something she could prevent, being as the forces of narrativium required that Shinji experience and reject the closed world which HIP created, but, without her at the crux of crucial events, Seele would have succeeded and created their own "utopia".

Is Yui really the person who you think she is, Carl? Would someone who wanted to direct the destiny of humanity to her own arrogant ends eradicate all 'superhuman interference' from the planet Earth, preventing any chance of a similar future calamity, and even petrifying herself until she was safely away from humanity's grasp? Would she see to it that all souls were freed and allowed to mold their own future from that point forward? You call her a megalomaniac, but the divine power she takes comes only with many sacrifices -- leaving her mortal body, relinquishing the family life she seemed to have wanted, becoming a prisoner of her new body for all but the rarest instances, and then, when the greatest tragedy has been thwarted, accepting a fate as lonely and selfless as whatever Lilith and Adam had suffered.

Perhaps it was a mistake for Yui to ever have a child, but I wouldn't consider her a bad mother by any means. (It should be mentioned that she was one person in the show who loved Shinji unconditionally.) She accepted her fate as the logical choice, given her circumstances, and people tend not to consider what her circumstances actually were. Even though she was born into Seele, she intended to thwart their plans, and what better way to do it than from the inside? They needed her talent to forge their tools for 3I, and perhaps it was Yui's intent all along to turn their own 'media for humanity's future' against them.

At any rate, it is insinuated, however vaguely, that Seele knew about her intentions and they weren't afraid of erasing her as they had erased so many others, since, by 2003, she had essentially served her purpose. In that case, the better of her choices was to become the Eva, and thus go from being expendable to indispensable. As the Eva, with Shinji as her pilot, she could, relatively speaking, be more of a mother than she would be lying in a ditch somewhere, being eaten by maggots.

I think Gendo is, by far, the weaker of the two. I doubt it was ever Yui's intent for Shinji to be abandoned by him. Had Gendo been a proper parental presence in his life and upfront about Yui's fate, would Shinji have been better off? At least Yui did not shield Shinji from the truth, however young he may have been at the time.
Last edited by Reichu on Thu Jun 02, 2005 5:36 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Postby DatDude » Thu Jun 02, 2005 5:13 pm

Reichu wrote:I think Gendo is, by far, the weaker of the two. I doubt it was ever Yui's intent for Shinji to be abandoned by him. Had Gendo been a proper parental presence in his life and upfront about Yui's fate, would Shinji have been better off? At least Yui did not shield Shinji from the truth, however young he may have been at the time.


I'm with you 100% on that last part Reichu.
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Postby Shin-seiki » Thu Jun 02, 2005 5:30 pm

DatDude wrote:Two things how do you know it was her intention? I remember his talk with Fuyutsuki aluded to somthing, but I don't trust any of the flashbacks with Yui in them. The people that have them ( flashbeacks of Yui ) have strong feelings for her, and I think they cloud the memory.
I'm frankly a bit mystified where you're coming from with this. Is there any reason at all to suppose that the flashbacks involving Yui are anything but straight-forward narrative? I have never gotten the idea that Anno is ever playing POV games with his presentation of the story; certainly not in the parts that are presented as objective reality, as opposed to the head-trip sequences...

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Postby DatDude » Thu Jun 02, 2005 6:23 pm

Shin-seiki wrote:
DatDude wrote:Two things how do you know it was her intention? I remember his talk with Fuyutsuki aluded to somthing, but I don't trust any of the flashbacks with Yui in them. The people that have them ( flashbeacks of Yui ) have strong feelings for her, and I think they cloud the memory.
I'm frankly a bit mystified where you're coming from with this. Is there any reason at all to suppose that the flashbacks involving Yui are anything but straight-forward narrative? I have never gotten the idea that Anno is ever playing POV games with his presentation of the story; certainly not in the parts that are presented as objective reality, as opposed to the head-trip sequences...


Its the head trip scenes that gave me the idea. Perception defines reality holds true a lot in eva.

If you look at the flashback scene with Yui, Fuyutsuki, and baby Shinji. Every things perfect the day is warm the sky seems blue, Yui looks beutiful, and the old man seems to be stealing a few looks at the young lady. Baby Shinji wants momma breast, lots of imagry their for the kid and the old man. :P

Any scene in the show were your inside some one head, plays the POV game and in this one its Fuyutsuki's.
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Postby ObsessiveMathsFreak » Thu Jun 02, 2005 7:02 pm

Carl Horn wrote:With all that talk about what a great mommy Yui is, I point out that Shinji started off EVA a sullen but presentable boy, and ended it a blank-eyed psycho trying to strangle someone. Real good job there, O wise mother goddess. Don't listen to that claptrap about future happiness she spouts to Rei and Kaworu--I say, look at the results in Shinji.

Yui's words about happiness are not hollow, but ring true throughout the series as a whole. They are essentially words of hope, first spoken to the despairing Gendou, and hope and choosing hope over despair when things seem their worst, is what Evangelion is all about after all.

Reichu wrote:Perhaps it was a mistake for Yui to ever have a child,

Just on this, I feel that Shinji was in fact the lynchpin of, certainly Yui's and possibly Gendou's plan. One might hazard the shakey theory that Gendou's primary use to Yui was as a sperm donor.

Reichu wrote:I doubt it was ever Yui's intent for Shinji to be abandoned by him.

Unlikely as it may seem, perhaps this was a part of a prearranged scenario between the two. If Shinji's presence during 3I was such a critical part of Yui's "Ark/Ascension" version, then keeping SEELE in the dark about him would have been of utmost importance. Perhaps then Shinji was sent away, in part, to allay any suspicions they may have had. They did seem surprised that Gendou made use of him at all in episode #02. Note also, the effect this had on Shinji was a surprise to Gendou. Gendou confident and unrattled all through episode #01, right up until he sees for himself what a wreck Shinji has become.

Clearly, to fully analyses Yui's motives and character, one would first need to decypher exactly what the hell was everyone trying to accomplish with 3I, what the "rules" were, and what part each character had to play in everyone's scenario. One would also have to find out just how many scenario's there were. Personally, I like to think there were 2/3. SEELE's, Gendou's(with Yui and Fuyutsuki) and perhaps Yui's alone(possibly with Fuyutsuki). One could say the Angels had a scenario as well.

One day, I'll start a thread, detailing all my mad ravings on all this. It is after all, the first mystery my brain embarked on when I began posting. Perhaps if I resolve it, I can finally be at peace.
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Postby Soluzar » Thu Jun 02, 2005 7:18 pm

DatDude wrote:
Shin-seiki wrote:
DatDude wrote:Two things how do you know it was her intention? I remember his talk with Fuyutsuki aluded to somthing, but I don't trust any of the flashbacks with Yui in them. The people that have them ( flashbeacks of Yui ) have strong feelings for her, and I think they cloud the memory.

I'm frankly a bit mystified where you're coming from with this. Is there any reason at all to suppose that the flashbacks involving Yui are anything but straight-forward narrative? I have never gotten the idea that Anno is ever playing POV games with his presentation of the story; certainly not in the parts that are presented as objective reality, as opposed to the head-trip sequences...


Its the head trip scenes that gave me the idea. Perception defines reality holds true a lot in eva.

If you look at the flashback scene with Yui, Fuyutsuki, and baby Shinji. Every things perfect the day is warm the sky seems blue, Yui looks beutiful, and the old man seems to be stealing a few looks at the young lady. Baby Shinji wants momma breast, lots of imagry their for the kid and the old man. :P

Any scene in the show were your inside some one head, plays the POV game and in this one its Fuyutsuki's.


It's true that coming as they do at the end of EoE, the last scenes with Yui & Fuyutsuki could be said to be perhaps somewhat unreal. Or at least, I can imagine the thought process that leads to this conclusion, since probably over half of EoE, as well as the whole of the TV ending was unreal, or a product of instrumentality.

If this scene was, in fact, a product of instrumentality, then we would be seeing it either from the POV of Shinji, or that of Fuyutsuki, since Yui is not, to the best of my knowledge, able to participate in the complementation of souls as long as she remains embodied in her Evangelion form.

I personally have not seen any cause to regard this scene as unreal so far, but I can imagine the thought process that gives rise to this conclusion. My first question is, even if the scene is from Fuyutsuki's POV, what is to prevent him from having remembered it accurately?

When it comes to the flashbacks which were presented in #21 we have a somewhat different case, I believe. Although the POV presented appears to be that of Fuyutsuki, I do not believe that there is any reason to doubt that these flashbacks represent anything different from the truth.

Many of the events in this sequence are supported by what we see elsewhere in the anime, and I just don't see a reason to doubt this sequence. It is open for debate, naturally, but I think that you'd be hard pressed to find a logical reason to assume that it's not literally true.

The only reason that this material was even presented in the form of a flashback, is that there are no good ways to travel back in time, narratalogically speaking. you can begin at the earliest point in your story which has significance, and do your exposition through some kind of a prologue, or you can tackle it by referring to events prior to the beginning of your narrative. This is sometimes referred to as starting in media res, or literally, "in the middle".

Having chosen to begin in media res, there are then several ways that you can build up the backstory of your narrative world. You can have the characters discuss past events, which sometimes feels clumsy, especially when dealing with a large amount of past events. That's exposition through dialog. The other major way employed in visual media, although much less so in prose, is exposition through flashback. They are usually purely a technique for getting across to the audience that which took place prior to the events depicted on screen, and as such, are usually literal, and not interpretive.

There is also another kind of flashback, in which events are presented from the perspective of one of the characters, but the character is an unreliable witness. By this I mean that he describes a version of events which is not objectively true. It seems to me that this is what you are assuming episode #21 to be, and it is worth noticing that this type of flashback is almost exclusively limited to events occuring during the course of a narrative.

In some cases, the event is something which the audience have not seen occur in objective reality, and this is a useful technique in suspense, or mystery stories, where the key to narrative tension is keeping the audience unaware of the crucial information. In other cases, it is events that the audience have seen take place in objective reality, and the key to narrative tension in this situation is to place the audience in a position of information superiority over the protagonist. We know something that they do not, and thus we see their situation more clearly than they do themselves. This technique is often employed with tragedy, but also with psychological thrillers.

The events which take place after the begining, and before the end of a narrative have a certain fluidity, it should be noted. They are to be shaped and molded by the actions of the characters, and certain events may not be revealed until the crucial moment. Event which take place outside of the scope of the narrative, however, which take place "in the past" from the perspective of the characters, usually remain concrete, and as such, they are not usually subject to the distorting techniques described above. The only usual exception is when events are related to the audience by a character who has been, or will be, demonstrated to be an unreliable witness. It will usually be the case that the objective truth will be revealed in these cases.

My apologies for rambling on, but my own studies have indicated that flashbacks of this nature, when used for exposition, are not often distorted. Anno is not delivering this part of the plot in this manner in order that he can obfuscate the truth, he is simply relating these events to the viewer in the best way available to him. It is mandated by the narrative structure that these events take place in the past, for who would have wished the anime to begin with 2nd Impact, and move forwards from there?

A beginning in media res can help to alleviate the problem of long, boring stretches in a narrative where nothing happens, by moving those sections out of the narrative, and into the backround of the story. That's my 2 cents.
Datdude wrote:Also, do we ever get anything close to hard proof to the theory that Shinji knew on some level that Yui was in the eva and thats why it could save him by going beserk? I know the only time/s we see Unit-2 go crazy are when Shinjis in their with Asuka, and in EoE after Asuka realizes her mothers in the eva.


Shinji: Mother!

That line is from EoE, and it is completely 100% undeniable in its meaning. Before that, it is doubtful that Shinji was awere on any conscious level, and it seems to me that even if he became aware of the notion, he would still reject it. It's a notion that takes time to get used to, and for Shinji, there are a lot of things standing in the way of that realisation.
DatDude wrote:This matches my point of view when it comes to Gendo, but can you enlightn me on how Yui has a god complex? Seeing as we se so little of her directly in the show its been hard for be to pin her down character wise ( most of what we see of her is in the form of flashbacks from people with deep feelings of affection for her).
Wanting to live as the Evangelion could be seen by some as a God complex. There is supporting evidence in #21 for this, as well as in EoE

The 'Chu wrote:Yui is certainly mysterious, but I've always viewed her as being too down-to-Earth to be the arch-villainous you see her as. Whatever her exact motives, I think she should be granted some credit for being the very force that puts the lid on Instrumentality and any possibility of it ever happening on Earth again. Of course, Instrumentality being initiated wasn't something she could prevent, being as the forces of narrativium required that Shinji experience and reject the closed world which HIP created, but, without her at the crux of crucial events, Seele would have succeeded and created their own "utopia"


I find this analysis correct, but considerably less detail is required in order to banish all charges of Yui being a villainess. ^_^

It seems to me adequate to simply say that she knew that Third Impact could not be prevented from occurring, given the circumstances, so she decided to take a hand in it rather than allowing Seele to have their way unopposed.
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Postby Carl Horn » Thu Jun 02, 2005 8:33 pm

I don't think Yui sees herself as a villain, but then villains usually don't. I suppose that my suspicion (and this is also a theme I've harped on before) is in the notion of the "inevitability" of the Third Impact. The problematic piece for me in this is SEELE. I get very suspicious of anything "inevitable" where human beings seem integral to it happening.
If the Angels, who come equipped with A.T. Fields and bitchin' tentacles and rays, can be killed, why not try and kill those crusty old men in SEELE? They may hide themselves away, but we have no reason to believe if you found them Kiel would be any harder to kill, than say, Sachiel.

I say, forget the Third Impact, the Second Impact already made those associated with it worse killers than Hitler, Stalin, and Mao combined. Again, if it really HAD been a meteorite at near-light speed, then you could say it was something beyond human control. But 2I also had our little monkey fingerprints all over the crime scene. And what did Gendo have to say about it to Fuyutsuki when they took their little Carnival Cruise down to Antarctica? He didn't even express regret. What about all the motherless children 2I created?

Didn't Gendo and Fuyutsuki foresee the danger of Kiel getting the JSSDF to eliminate NERV if they got too disobedient, or if their usefulness was over? They always knew the Japanese government didn't trust NERV; that goes back to episode seven. Was Kaji, who worked for both SEELE and the Japanese government, someone who was keeping the situation in balance? With Kaji dead, the Ministry of the Interior would have no one to gainsay an opinion to attack NERV--although there is the distinct possibility the primary use of Kaji's intelligence was to develop an attack plan the government had already agreed to, a la Tony Blair (the JSSDF certanly seemed to know what they were doing and where they were going). As the "bridge crew" points out, their HQ is designed to resist Angel attack, not a commando raid. Why not? Why even bother to issue pistols to the bridge crew? Any force breaking that far into NERV is likely to be armed with assault rifles, flamethrowers, RPGs--in other words, the stuff soldiers use.

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Postby Soluzar » Thu Jun 02, 2005 9:15 pm

Carl Horn wrote:I don't think Yui sees herself as a villain, but then villains usually don't. I suppose that my suspicion (and this is also a theme I've harped on before) is in the notion of the "inevitability" of the Third Impact. The problematic piece for me in this is SEELE. I get very suspicious of anything "inevitable" where human beings seem integral to it happening.

If the Angels, who come equipped with A.T. Fields and bitchin' tentacles and rays, can be killed, why not try and kill those crusty old men in SEELE? They may hide themselves away, but we have no reason to believe if you found them Kiel would be any harder to kill, than say, Sachiel.
Third impact was going to happen, even if you killed all of SEELE. It was the direct consequence of Second Impact.

I say, forget the Third Impact, the Second Impact already made those associated with it worse killers than Hitler, Stalin, and Mao combined. Again, if it really HAD been a meteorite at near-light speed, then you could say it was something beyond human control. But 2I also had our little monkey fingerprints all over the crime scene. And what did Gendo have to say about it to Fuyutsuki when they took their little Carnival Cruise down to Antarctica? He didn't even express regret. What about all the motherless children 2I created?


You appear to be making a straw man. That's not entirely fair. If you weren't intending to do that, then I apologise, but it seems as though you've grossly misinterpreted my post.

Where in my post do I suggest that causing Second Impact was anything less than unforgiveable and a heinous act? This message is thoroughly carried across by the anime, and the only thing you can say in the defense of the researchers in question is that they may not have been fully aware of the consequences of their actions.

Didn't Gendo and Fuyutsuki foresee the danger of Kiel getting the JSSDF to eliminate NERV if they got too disobedient, or if their usefulness was over?
Yes. They did. I'm not in the business of defending Gendo, or Fuyutsuki, here, Carl. You are going way off-topic for this thread, as well, I might add.

They always knew the Japanese government didn't trust NERV; that goes back to episode seven. Was Kaji, who worked for both SEELE and the Japanese government, someone who was keeping the situation in balance? With Kaji dead, the Ministry of the Interior would have no one to gainsay an opinion to attack NERV--although there is the distinct possibility the primary use of Kaji's intelligence was to develop an attack plan the government had already agreed to, a la Tony Blair (the JSSDF certanly seemed to know what they were doing and where they were going). As the "bridge crew" points out, their HQ is designed to resist Angel attack, not a commando raid. Why not? Why even bother to issue pistols to the bridge crew? Any force breaking that far into NERV is likely to be armed with assault rifles, flamethrowers, RPGs--in other words, the stuff soldiers use.


What exactly is the relevance of any of this tub-thumping to anything ANYone just said in this thread? Just asking...

My apologies if this post seems pugnacious, but you are re-taking ground that was won before this debate started. Nobody fundamentally disagrees with most of the points you are making, except that the first one is somewhat over-simplified.

Finally, I just don't see any support in your post for your actual point, beyond the bald statement that may be so. What does any of this have to do with Yui?
Last edited by Soluzar on Thu Jun 02, 2005 9:21 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Postby Reichu » Thu Jun 02, 2005 9:20 pm

Carl Horn wrote:I don't think Yui sees herself as a villain, but then villains usually don't. I suppose that my suspicion (and this is also a theme I've harped on before) is in the notion of the "inevitability" of the Third Impact. The problematic piece for me in this is SEELE. I get very suspicious of anything "inevitable" where human beings seem integral to it happening.


I was hoping you would address the points presented in my passionate defense of Yui, but instead they are just ignored entirely. :( Now you're not talking about whether or not Yui is a good guy; you're questioning the backbone of the entire narrative! Talk about making the debate more convoluted than it already is. Take note that the tirade in your previous post only mentions Yui once -- is she just a scapegoat for your frustrations?

NGE is a case of the ol' "the greatest enemy is from within". The enemy: Seele. Keep in mind that Seele is not just that crowd of a few familiar faces -- it is an international organization that has been around for quite some time, pulling the strings of the world FROM THE BACKGROUND. These are old religious zealots of incredible power who have access to every resource at humanity's disposal, and then some -- money, people, technology, 'supernatural phenomena' (= extraterrestrial hocus pocus). Are you really suggesting you would have preferred a narrative in which Yui and Gendo led a band of assassins bent on hunting down every last member of Seele? I'm sure Seele has dealt with that kind of threat before, and any opposition would have their asses handed to them in short order every time. The only feasible way to make your premise work would be for Yui to go hunt them all down after she gets the S^2 and thus becomes theoretically unstoppable -- "Yui Ikari: The 50~200-meter Assassin".

In any case, I don't think Anno was opting to tell that kind of story. There is definitely a certain futility, to some extent, of overanalyzing the "whys" of stories like this: Events are inevitable because the forces of the world are powered by narrativium. Second Impact HAD TO happen because it set the stage for the story Anno wanted to tell. Third Impact HAD TO happen because it was the medium through which the main character would learn that living in reality and being himself were better than the alternatives.

All that said, how on Earth was Yui -- the bioengineering nerd who stopped Seele's "Operation Human Hive Mind" by imbuing one of the supernatural toys she made for them with her own will -- on the side of evil? How was she merely delusioning herself that she was on the side of right? In the end, she succeeded, although by a different means than you proposed. You proposed merely eliminating Seele, but, instead, Yui eliminated the very things that had enabled events like 2I and 3I from occurring in the first place.

If you are going to attack the logistics of the narrative, fine. But warping one of NGE's veritable heroes into an arch-fiend is going a bit too far, in my opinion.
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Postby DatDude » Thu Jun 02, 2005 9:30 pm

Third impact was going to happen, even if you killed all of SEELE.


Nothing is writen in stone in this life friend, and EVA never points to the future being completely forseen in the deadsea scrolls. Somthings are even writen in the scrolls that does not even happen ( the number of angels ).

Just imagin if Seele WAS killed and their MP eva's not produced, who whould have started 3I with all the other Angels dead? Gendo would have tryed but Rei would have lets be nice and say " taken adam away " and the story would have ended their. Their was 3I being caused by Seele for her to need to ( or wish to ) give control of to Shinji. Things would have stoped with EP 25 more then likly.
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Postby ObsessiveMathsFreak » Thu Jun 02, 2005 9:35 pm

Soluzar wrote:
Datdude wrote:Also, do we ever get anything close to hard proof to the theory that Shinji knew on some level that Yui was in the eva and thats why it could save him by going beserk? I know the only time/s we see Unit-2 go crazy are when Shinjis in their with Asuka, and in EoE after Asuka realizes her mothers in the eva.


Shinji: Mother!

That line is from EoE, and it is completely 100% undeniable in its meaning.

Also his words at the beginning of episode #25
Shinji:You say I have to fight in this?
Mother! Say something! answer me!

This scene is not a moment of realisation for Shinji about his mother. He seems to have figured it out before. How long before is the question.

Soluzar wrote:Before that, it is doubtful that Shinji was awere on any conscious level, and it seems to me that even if he became aware of the notion, he would still reject it. It's a notion that takes time to get used to, and for Shinji, there are a lot of things standing in the way of that realisation.

It would seem that by episode #07, Shinji still hadn't realised just who was inside Eva Unit-01.
Shinji:What is Eva? The entry plug smells a lot like blood.
But I feel so comfortable and relaxed here. Why?
After all, I don't know anything.

So at least we know that he hasn't figured it out instantly.

I'd argue that Shinji realises that Yui is within the Eva, either in episode #16, episode #20 or episode #23. In the first two, he would certainly have begun to suspect, and if he still hadn't figured it out, Ritsuko's educational "tour" of Terminal Dogma, punctuated by the very image of his dead mother was surely an event after which we can say almost for certain that he knew who was in Eva Unit-01. Was this the purpose of the "tour"?
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Postby Soluzar » Thu Jun 02, 2005 9:36 pm

Reichu wrote:In any case, I don't think Anno was opting to tell that kind of story. There is definitely a certain futility, to some extent, of overanalyzing the "whys" of stories like this: Events are inevitable because the forces of the world are powered by narrativium. Second Impact HAD TO happen because it set the stage for the story Anno wanted to tell. Third Impact HAD TO happen because it was the medium through which the main character would learn that living in reality and being himself were better than the alternatives.


On a different level than the one which I'm looking at things from, this is also the truth. Why is Third Impact inevitable? Because it's what the story is about. Claiming otherwise is pointless. It is manifestly what the story is about. Third impact is the medium through which the psychology of Shinji Ikari is ultimately expored. Without that event, Evangelion would be muc closer to being what it has often been accused of being - an anime devoid of characters development.

The morality of the millions of lives lost, and the millons of souls complemented is not a primary focus of the narrative, and should not properly be regarded as important in the story. I can understand why that attitude might not sit well with some people, but those millions were just plot coupons, in my opinion.

In so far as we are to consider the morality of that event, it is proper to ask how much influence Yui Ikari had over the events which led to Second Impact. It seems to me that she did not have a great deal, but I may be guilty of having ignored important evidence to the contrary. Instead, it would appear that when presented with a bad situation, she took the course of action which she felt would best ameliorate the long-term outcome. YMMV, of course.

All that said, how on Earth was Yui -- the bioengineering nerd who stopped Seele's "Operation Human Hive Mind" by imbuing one of the supernatural toys she made for them with her own will -- on the side of evil? How was she merely delusioning herself that she was on the side of right? In the end, she succeeded, although by a different means than you proposed. You proposed merely eliminating Seele, but, instead, Yui eliminated the very things that had enabled events like 2I and 3I from occurring in the first place.
I couldn't agree more. Please remember, Carl, that if Yui had not joined SEELE, then there is a very real possibility that they would have found someone else to create the Evangelion for them, and someone else to build all of their other toys, and that Second, and ultimately Third Impact would have taken place, without the influence of Yui OR Shinji. How do you suppose that would turn out?

If you are going to attack the logistics of the narrative, fine. But warping one of NGE's veritable heroes into an arch-fiend is going a bit too far, in my opinion.
NGE is not a show for heroes, I feel, but she is far from the villain of the piece. If a king rat should be named, surely that would be Keel Lorenz, or possibly Gendo himself?

One more thing. Although I edited it somewhat, the tone of my above post started out as excessively confrontational. I trust that you will accept my apologies for any offence given? Although I try to keep on top of it, my brain has a nasty tendancy to get overheated when locked in the midst of a debate. This apology, of course, should not be taken to imply that I believe any less in the arguments that I put forward. :twisted:

DatDude wrote:
Third impact was going to happen, even if you killed all of SEELE.


Nothing is writen in stone in this life friend, and EVA never points to the future being completely forseen in the deadsea scrolls. Somthings are even writen in the scrolls that does not even happen ( the number of angels ).

Just imagin if Seele WAS killed and their MP eva's not produced, who whould have started 3I with all the other Angels dead? Gendo would have tryed but Rei would have lets be nice and say " taken adam away " and the story would have ended their. Their was 3I being caused by Seele for her to need to ( or wish to ) give control of to Shinji. Things would have stoped with EP 25 more then likly.


In response to this post by DatDude, I would like to concede that rather than being entirely inevitable, instead it might be better to say that Third Impact had a high probability of occurring, under any set of circumstances which followed the Second Impact. This has not been the primary thrust of my argument, so I feel that I loose little by this concession. It would still have been impractical to assassinate every SEELE member, and Third Impact may have happened in any case.
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