While pulling screen-caps for another topic, this cut in #26' caught my attention:


(for reference, the cut immediately follows this one, where Fuyutsuki is going on about Lilith's egg)


Now this cut is on screen for less than two seconds, and while I certainly recall seeing it, to the extent that I paid it any mind at all, it vaguely registered on my brain thus: female in NERV uniform + handgun = overhead shot of Maya, still being her useless-in-a-firefight self. But if you bother to pause and take a look at it, it's immediately apparent that this not Maya; for one thing, the red lighting (other cuts of the bridge in this part of the movie aren't under emergency lights), for another, the previous cut with Maya about a minute before shows her right where she's been since the shooting started (and where she stays in subsequent cuts): under the bridge console with her laptop:


So who is this, and what is going on here? When you take a close look, it's pretty grim:


She's slumped down in a pool of blood, with exit wounds on her back, and blood streaks running down the wall, and some spent rounds by her feet.
In front of her, about ten feet away, what at first glance looked like a vague black blob turns out to be the body of a dead JSDF soldier, also surrounded by spent ammo and clips:


So I guess maybe the idea is something like this: he cornered her against the wall and shot her, but she was able to take him with her. I suppose the point of this cut is to illustrate why there's no more shooting from this point on in the movie: everyone's pretty much killed each other, leaving only Fuyutsuki and the others atop the command center alive.

Interestingly, this is the third time in the movie that we've seen this 'slide down the wall, leave blood streak' deal; the first two times are a bit more obvious:




Normally, when I see the same sort of thing three times in NGE, I figure that Anno is trying to make some point or other. The (karmic?) connection of the first two instances is pretty apparent, but I wonder what Anno may have had in mind by repeating this blood/wall/slide/streak thing yet again here. It's apparent that the red lighting serves to obscure what's going on in this cut; if it were normally lit, there'd be two big, bright, red pools of blood in the shot that would stand out, and make it much more obvious what we're seeing.

So anyway, did anyone else notice this cut, and what actually was going on in it?

I don't think it has any major significance.

Thoughts on a possible in-universe explanation:
Some of them could have simply been backed into a wall with no where else to turn having to face their inevitable fate.

Possible behind the scenes explanation:
It could have been done just for the sake of doing it and being grim. What could it mean other than showing the ruthlessness of the JSSDF soldiers?

Joseph the PRPD wrote:Possible behind the scenes explanation:
It could have been done just for the sake of doing it and being grim. What could it mean other than showing the ruthlessness of the JSSDF soldiers?

That everyone's dead, thus why there's no more gunfire in the background.

Shin-seiki wrote:Normally, when I see the same sort of thing three times in NGE, I figure that Anno is trying to make some point or other. The (karmic?) connection of the first two instances is pretty apparent, but I wonder what Anno may have had in mind by repeating this blood/wall/slide/streak thing yet again here.

Does it mean to serve Anno's opinion of war? Two sides shooting at each other, but both end up dying, bringing to question the reasoning behind the shooting in the first place. "Why? What is the point?" Does Anno have an anti-war sentiment, believing that pointless fighting only leads to tragic results? After the entire series of Evangelion, the constant fighting between the two sides at conflict, we do get the tragic ending of Shinji and Asuka alone on the beach in the ruins that war left behind.

I may just be shooting in the dark here, but this was my initial impression when reading the topic post.

EDIT: We also get the streak of blood left on the Moon, if that holds any relation to these three shots.

Ornette wrote:That everyone's dead, thus why there's no more gunfire in the background.

Well, yeah, that's a given.

Looking at it from an purely editing standpoint, the shot really represents for a nice juxtaposition between two opposing forces that weigh heavily on the show, with Fuyutsuki bringing up how the Egg of Lillith is the source of all human life, and then that cut of the two dead agents.

Also, I doubt this is very significant, but it appears as if the dead female NERV agent is holding a pistol. Aoba offers her a similar pistol here:



And she says that she can't shoot it, to which Aoba responds

Episode 25' wrote:Aoba: Idiot! It's kill or be killed!

Maya never ends up shooting the pistol, and judging by her mental state, she was in no condition to. All things considered, she might have taken out one or two troopers before she finally kept her head up for too long and be tagged by JSSDF soldier, or something to the affect. Her killing a soldier and then dying, like the red screencap, would be something that refutes the kill or be killed statement, because both died.

So, I suppose that the image serves an albiet oddly designed juxtaposition. We could chalk this one up to Anno being artsy, though, and I doubt it has really that much plot significance.

Ornette wrote:That everyone's dead, thus why there's no more gunfire in the background.

If one really wanted to show the extent of the conflict that had taken NERV, it would probably work better to show a quick montage of wide shots spelling out the killing that took place in NERV's lower levels, no?

ran1 wrote:

Ornette wrote:That everyone's dead, thus why there's no more gunfire in the background.

If one really wanted to show the extent of the conflict that had taken NERV, it would probably work better to show a quick montage of wide shots spelling out the killing that took place in NERV's lower levels, no?

What if the shot's just there to prove that it's a no-win situation, both in regard to JSSDF invasion of NERV and to human kind's "dead end" scenario outlined by SEELE's interpretation of the Dead Sea scrolls, overall 'necessity'/inevitability of 3I, path humanity's been on since post-2I, etc? I need to rewatch EoE for a better grasp of the context, though.

My view of the cut is that it is part of a series of shots throughout EoE showing the grim effects of the battle.

[wkimg width=350]M25 nerv blood pool.jpg[/wkimg]

[wkimg width=250]M25 battle 10.jpg[/wkimg] [wkimg width=250]M25 battle 20.jpg[/wkimg]

[wkimg width=250]M25 battle 30.jpg[/wkimg] [wkimg width=250]M25 battle 40.jpg[/wkimg]

Shin-seiki wrote:So I guess maybe the idea is something like this: he cornered her against the wall and shot her, but she was able to take him with her.

This seems a reasonable assessment. However, there is no reason these two were necessarily the ones who killed each other. They may only be two dead soldier from opposite sides. Along these lines, and with regard to the following....

Shin-seiki wrote:I suppose the point of this cut is to illustrate why there's no more shooting from this point on in the movie: everyone's pretty much killed each other, leaving only Fuyutsuki and the others atop the command center alive.

...I think the most similar cut to this red one is the following

[wkimg width=350]M26 battle 20.jpg[/wkimg]
Here again we have bodies of soldier from each side strewn about in the aftermath of the battle.

One of the big questions in EoE is actually how the bridge crew manage to seemingly be the only ones left alive in the command center. What exactly happened to all the SSDF forces and the Nerv personnel? While it seems a stretch to to say that essentially everyone is dead, these shots do seem to imply that this is indeed the case. However, I'm inclined to think that the attack has petered out over the interim and everyone is simply laying low. The JSSDF attack may also have stalled after Unit-02's or perhaps Unit-01's appearance.

Shin-seiki wrote:So anyway, did anyone else notice this cut, and what actually was going on in it?

One thing the layout of the cut brought to mind was that perhaps the Nerv operator had in fact shot herself after having been shot. See a higher resolution image, I don't think that's the case, but the way she is slumped over brings a suicide of some kind to mind.

I have a feeling that when 01 blew up the pyramid on her way to the surface everyone else still alive stopped fighting to watch the spectacle.

How did the JSSDF suffer so many casualties? They're special forces after all.

LeoXiao wrote:How did the JSSDF suffer so many casualties? They're special forces after all.

Everybody at Nerv has some basic training with a firearm, and most probably have higher forms of training, considering that most of them may have transferred from other military positions. So it's not quite surprising that they were able to put up quite a fight against the JSSDF.

NemZ wrote:I have a feeling that when 01 blew up the pyramid on her way to the surface everyone else still alive stopped fighting to watch the spectacle.

Yes. Their (final) spectacle... hahahaha ha.

Sachi wrote:Everybody at Nerv has some basic training with a firearm, and most probably have higher forms of training, considering that most of them may have transferred from other military positions. So it's not quite surprising that they were able to put up quite a fight against the JSSDF.

Many shots throughout the film show NERV agents being shot or killed, or already dead; It was probably only when Misato called for the bakelite infusion that the attack really started to stall. Even Fuyutsuki noted that it was only a matter of time before the base was taken.

ran1 wrote:Also, I doubt this is very significant, but it appears as if the dead female NERV agent is holding a pistol. Aoba offers her a similar pistol here:

[IMG]

And she says that she can't shoot it, to which Aoba responds

Episode 25' wrote:Aoba: Idiot! It's kill or be killed!

Good catch! I think you may very well be onto something here, because EoE on the whole is stuffed full of scenes and/or bits of dialog that serve as ironic pay-offs to earlier scenes; it seems like irony is Anno's favorite flavor of dramatic device. So this cut could very well be intended (by showing a NERV tech that superficially resembles Maya, but who went down fighting) to show that it's more like "kill and be killed" rather than "kill or be killed". And maybe the correlation with Misato killing the soldier and her own death scene applies similarly as well...

I find it ironic that not only is Aoba wrong in that the above mystery girl kills AND is killed, but also that Maya outlives literally everyone else without firing the damn thing. I'm pretty sure that not only does she live to see the start of Instrumentality, but she's also the last person on the Bridge to be Complemented, right?

(I wonder if it has anything to do with Giant Naked Rei feeling her up on her way upright.)

Sachi wrote:

LeoXiao wrote:How did the JSSDF suffer so many casualties? They're special forces after all.

Everybody at Nerv has some basic training with a firearm, and most probably have higher forms of training, considering that most of them may have transferred from other military positions. So it's not quite surprising that they were able to put up quite a fight against the JSSDF.

the same personal wich watch guards suffered a sneak ninja death ? right ......
most of them were doing teir stuff when bullets started flying.
and the op shot is not maya becouse she becames tang later.
its just there to show death and stuff

I still think to whole relationship has Anti-war all over it. Especially considering the irony of Maya being the last to go.

ran1 wrote:Many shots throughout the film show NERV agents being shot or killed, or already dead; It was probably only when Misato called for the bakelite infusion that the attack really started to stall. Even Fuyutsuki noted that it was only a matter of time before the base was taken.

bladerj wrote:the same personal wich watch guards suffered a sneak ninja death ? right ......
most of them were doing teir stuff when bullets started flying.

I never said they would be able to put up a good fight, but they held their own fairly well, considering the circumstances. The only people who suspected an attack by the JSSDF before hand were Gendo and Fuyutsuki, and you know that they didn't say anything about it; everybody else was surprise attacked, and most probably weren't carrying weapons on them. The Bridge Bunnies had to dig into their drawers for their weapons, so I doubt anybody other than the security personnel had weapons with them, and were able to put up a fight back. However, by the time the fight had reached Central Dogma, Nerv was (somewhat) prepared and able to put up a better defense, even if it was futile. Otherwise, they would have just been run over like nothing.

Imagine for a second...

You are fighting off these swat personal that have invaded your place of employment. You don't know the true reasons behind what happens at NERV but you do your job. You are fighting, fighting...fighting, people are dieing all around you and finally after the gun shots have stopped..

You look up, see the Eva you know what it is but only so much..It starts to glow then....

nothingness

Otakon 08 Ikari wrote:You look up, see the Eva you know what it is but only so much..It starts to glow then....

nothingness

Nice try, but inevitably you'd get harassed by your greatest desire/fear and then you'd be turned into orange juice.

Sachi wrote:I still think to whole relationship has Anti-war all over it. Especially considering the irony of Maya being the last to go.

ran1 wrote:Many shots throughout the film show NERV agents being shot or killed, or already dead; It was probably only when Misato called for the bakelite infusion that the attack really started to stall. Even Fuyutsuki noted that it was only a matter of time before the base was taken.

bladerj wrote:the same personal wich watch guards suffered a sneak ninja death ? right ......
most of them were doing teir stuff when bullets started flying.

I never said they would be able to put up a good fight, but they held their own fairly well, considering the circumstances. The only people who suspected an attack by the JSSDF before hand were Gendo and Fuyutsuki, and you know that they didn't say anything about it; everybody else was surprise attacked, and most probably weren't carrying weapons on them. The Bridge Bunnies had to dig into their drawers for their weapons, so I doubt anybody other than the security personnel had weapons with them, and were able to put up a fight back. However, by the time the fight had reached Central Dogma, Nerv was (somewhat) prepared and able to put up a better defense, even if it was futile. Otherwise, they would have just been run over like nothing.

did you see the same movie that i did ?
they had lots of scenes showing worker being killed, one even has a soldier murdering in cold blood a girl, and the nerv soldiers were being killed in EVERY scene shown, then the jssdf declared they had it under control, in other words, THEY KILLED FREAKING EVERYBODY.
that was one of the most visceral though i had of this movie when i watched it.