Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby Jornophelanthas » Sun Aug 28, 2022 6:14 am

View Original PostMr. Tines wrote:While I don't have the quote to hand, it was definitely implied that she had been another comparatively recent arrival to the class (not just in episode 26).

I will add that the "slice of life" sequence from episode 26 is very much a parody of "school life" anime/manga tropes. It was a short-lived thought experiment of a possible universe during Instrumentality.

As such, it is not much of a stretch to imagine that these scenes could be seen as actual in-universe anime. What I mean by this is, if NGE had been a live-action series, these scenes would still be 2D animation. And if the characters found themselves as anime characters in an anime universe (with all the expectations and preconceptions of anime characters), then blue hair would certainly not be out of place there.

(No more than the social convention of the girl next door coming to wake up and embarrass the horny male protagonist every morning.)

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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby Zoop » Mon Sep 19, 2022 8:37 am

View Original PostMr. Tines wrote:While I don't have the quote to hand, it was definitely implied that she had been another comparatively recent arrival to the class (not just in episode 26).


Since the class is sort of a front for the Marduk-report children-candidates, I think it's safe to assume that pretty much all of them are relatively recent arrivals

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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby WDS » Wed Sep 28, 2022 9:22 pm

Blue and purple are naturally existing hair colors in the Evangelion universe because it's anime and that's how anime universes work.

What reason does the audience have to believe that there's a more complicated explanation than that?

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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby Archer » Sat Oct 01, 2022 7:57 am

View Original PostWDS wrote:Blue and purple are naturally existing hair colors in the Evangelion universe because it's anime and that's how anime universes work.

What reason does the audience have to believe that there's a more complicated explanation than that?

I don’t know how many times I have to explain that the only reason I’m even asking this is because this isn’t how Evangelion establishes its world. The only people with crazy hair colors are literal man-made alien hybrids, of which there are precisely two in existence, one of whom has presumably lived in a lab his entire life. Blue is not just a “naturally existing hair color” that would go completely unnoticed and unquestioned by the general populace.

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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby WDS » Sat Oct 01, 2022 6:20 pm

View Original PostArcher wrote:I don’t know how many times I have to explain that the only reason I’m even asking this is because this isn’t how Evangelion establishes its world. The only people with crazy hair colors are literal man-made alien hybrids


Spoiler alert: in anime, it's always the important characters who have the crazy hair colors and styles. It doesn't mean that they aren't actually those colors and styles in-universe.

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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby Blockio » Sat Oct 01, 2022 9:10 pm

WDS, I'm going to ask you to tone down the competitiveness of your posts. Not just in this thread, but in general.
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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby Kendrix » Sun Oct 02, 2022 7:13 pm

what makes me think that it is, if not actually blue then a stylized white (eg not just normal) is that in EoE, EVA 01 which is also created from lillith also has blue hair when it flies away in the end.
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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby HARVEST » Tue Nov 22, 2022 5:09 am

I remember some of the visual novel spinoffs (which are pretty much fanfics) say Rei's hair is blue.
And the ADV dub has Misato call Rei "a blue-haired babe" in the AU in Episode 26.

But these are either from officially-licenced-fanfic VNs or a translation that wasn't directly supervised by GAINAX/khara.
Misato never calls Rei "blue-haired" in the Japanese version or the Netflix dub.

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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby MsenjaKagami » Mon Mar 20, 2023 7:54 pm

This is partially a joke, but I think my favorite explanation of this detail is that her hair is indeed blue, and the reason nobody in-universe ever comments on it or questions it is because everyone recognizes how extremely rude it is to comment on or question someone's physical appearance like that ("Oh my god Suzuhara, you can't just ask someone why they're (hair is) blue" -Hikari, maybe). Or who knows, maybe everybody the characters meet are just very nice and nonjudgmental about this kind of thing.

And for anyone wondering, "Well what about Asuka? She sure wouldn't care about being rude to Rei"; that's certainly true, but I'd also say that Asuka probably wouldn't really care about this aspect of Rei either. The only thing about Rei that'd even interest her is the fact that she's an Eva pilot, and she'd see (subconsciously if not consciously) questioning her hair and eye color as beneath her.
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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby Astaroth » Thu Mar 30, 2023 10:38 am

Rei is blue to Asuka's red, It's pretty obvious. Evangelion's character design is very realistic, but it's obvious the main characters needed to stand out visually as much as possible and form a visual theme. Rei like Kaworu is obviously not a "natural" human, so one can assume people in-universe simply assume Rei dyes her hair and are polite about it in typical Japanese fashion. Meanwhile, everyone at Nerv knows better than to point it out, in a secretive and large organization like Nerv it might be the norm to receive a dismissal notice after a couple reckless comments.
To drive it further, it's likely a post-2nd impact world has bigger fish to fry than wondering about such details, which would be the concern of a more spoiled and self-indulgent society.
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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby AsukaisLiterallyMe » Thu Mar 30, 2023 7:55 pm

This is one of those questions that makes me feel like I'm having a stroke because it seems silly.

But then I start catching myself thinking about it and wondering "Wait does it actually show as blue to others or is that just creative license?"

Best kind of questions IMO.

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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby DTGee » Sat Apr 15, 2023 11:55 am

View Original PostHARVEST wrote:And the ADV dub has Misato call Rei "a blue-haired babe" in the AU in Episode 26.

Yet another reason why the ADV dub is superior

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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby Blockio » Sat Apr 15, 2023 7:50 pm

Please tell me that you don't actually mean that. The ADV dub is atrocious for anything apart from the AU sequence that line comes from
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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby DTGee » Sun Apr 16, 2023 1:50 am

I was part-joking, but the ADV dub is my preferred way to watch the show.

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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby Blockio » Sun Apr 16, 2023 2:17 pm

That's fair.
I can see why Gendo hired Misato to do the actual commanding. He tried it once and did an appalling job. ~ AWinters
Your point of view is horny, and biased. ~ glitz2hard
What about titty-ten? ~ Reichu
The movies function on their own terms. If people can't accept them on those terms, and keep expecting them to be NGE, then they probably should have realized a while ago that they weren't going to have a good time. ~ Words of wisdom courtesy of Reichu

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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby SEELE » Fri Apr 21, 2023 3:20 pm

I really thought back in the day that her hair (taint and also Kaworus colour pallet) was a form of Albinism (dunno if to her hybrid status as angel). I like to believe that as part of her fragil body (literally). I think this is what i liked about the blue hair because it could be a genetic explanation.
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Re: Is Rei’s hair literally blue?

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Postby shinryujimikihiko » Sun Apr 23, 2023 12:12 pm

I sometimes think it is a psychological tactic form Gendo to further alienate her from normal people and increase his control of her through social isolation.


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