I'm wondering if you guys can maybe help me find the source of a certain statement I've heard before in the Eva fandom. Apparently, when Anno was making the original Evangelion anime, in some of the very early concepts of it Shinji was originally going to be a female character. When I first heard that I was pretty surprised. You'd think more people in the fandom would be aware of a major piece of trivia like that, but the fact that nobody really talks about it has led me to wonder if that info is even true or if it's just an unsubstantiated rumor or a fact that somebody made up. Is anyone here able to shed show light on where this info regarding Shinji originally being a girl could have come from or if it is even true? It's got me curious and I'd really like to know. I know there's this thing called the Neon Genesis Evangelion: Proposal, which details all kinds of things from the early production of the anime, but looking at the article for it on the EvaGeeks Wiki I could not find any mention of Shinji originally being a girl in the early drafts there, so where did that piece of info come from?

Shun wrote:https://wiki.evageeks.org/Statements_by_Evangelion_Staff#Yoshiyuki_Sadamoto:_Interview_with_Yoshiyuki_Sadamoto_.28Der_Mond.29

Interesting, so it is true. I also remembering hearing a statement somewhat related to this regarding what Shinji's specific appearance as a female would have been, that statement being that Shinji would have had long hair that she would sometimes hide behind in stressful situations (or something like that). Any insight on where that bit of info came from?

https://www.evamonkey.com/writings/sada ... moment.php

Q: Did you have a model for his face.
A: Not particularly. The image of a hero in Japan is like Ushiwakamaru, the strong champion whom no adversity will affect. When you say "hero" in Japan, it conjures the impression of a man, just prior to middle age, accomplished at arms, with a burning spirit. Or maybe you think or a bishonen (beautiful young man). In the beginning I gave Shinji longer hair, so in the dramatic scenes, it could hide his face or wave in the breaze. But when I drew that, he looked a little too wild-and so delicate the slightest pressure would break him. So finally I tried for a look where you could see the forhead through the bangs, shorter hair-the look of a boyish young girl. Spreaking in concreate terms, his eyes are a girl's eyes. I drew them exactly as I drew Nadia's [the heroine of Gainax's 1990 TV series Nadia, forthcoming in English from A.D.V. Films-ed.] eyes. He's a male Nadia, just as if I had given Nadia a masculine makeover. Lengthen the eyelashes and change the hair style, and you have Nadia.

Very interesting stuff. It's got me thinking, given how some of the ideas from the Neon Genesis Evangelion: Proposal which never made it into the original anime were eventually reused or repurposed in the Rebuild movies, is it possible that the idea of a female Shinji was also reused, by being turned into its own separate character in the form of Mari? Mari being a repurposed version of the original concept for a female Shinji (with some tweaks) would make her less of a random addition to the Rebuilds that feels like it just came out of nowhere. Her and Shinji sharing a meta connection like that could also tie into Reichu's theory of Shinji and Mari being connected via the fact that they along with Asuka, and Kaworu were children that were raised in the Artificial Evolution Laboratory who house the souls of the four Adams.

When even Sadamoto is tired of drawing girls, you probably need to toss in a few male leads.