Sachi, I find your interpretation unnecessarily convoluted. Kaworu did tell Shinji to stop, and seemed to think something was up. If he really was just trying to manipulate Shinji into doing what Shinji wound up doing despite his protestations, why even bother?

ElMariachi wrote:^
Being good doesn't immunize from doing bad things, be it by accident or errors of judgment, Q was the prime example of this (else Shinji would be a villain and Misato a Nazi)
And I think that it was the same for Kaworu : he was a good guy, genuinely wanted Shinji's happiness, but was mislead into what said happiness was.
As the old saying says : "Hell is paved with good intentions".
Personally I find it very refreshing that Kaworu could have a darker side, that make him more human and less uncanny like his NGE incarnation.

As for his loyalty toward SEELE, I still think that his N°1 priority was Shinji's happiness, and that he would always put SEELE's scenario behind it, Q gave us the proof of that when he tried to stop the expedition with EVA-13 even though two LoL would still create SEELE's version of HIP. Simply put, according to this thread's theory, Kaworu and SEELE's objective coincided perfectly, since Kaworu thought that HIP was the key to Shinji's happiness, and Gendo's plan consisted to throw a wrench to make it so Kaworu and SEELE's objectives differs at the last minute and forces him to aboard the incoming Impact (that Shinji would trigger in his carefully crafted near-madness), sacrificing himself and thwarting both his and SEELE's plans, leaving Gendo free to enact his own version of Instrumentality.

And everything has gone just as planned.

Why necesseraly see good /bad , evil , good intent etc etc ?
especially for SEELE , evil society , evil people etc
I mean , the mother of Shinji is a seele girl (yes , yui)

They just have an agenda they want for humanity that's all.

^
SEELE obliterated half of mankind in their plans, and unlike Shinji knew exactly what they were doing, so that put them immediately in "bad guys" territory, even if their intents were the good of mankind, the ends doesn't always justify the means.

And as I say, someone can have genuine intentions for someone yet use means that are ultimately harmful, like Kaworu lying to Shinji.

Monk Ed wrote:Sachi, I find your interpretation unnecessarily convoluted. Kaworu did tell Shinji to stop, and seemed to think something was up. If he really was just trying to manipulate Shinji into doing what Shinji wound up doing despite his protestations, why even bother?

I agree with ElMariachi that the difference between Gendo and Seele's vision came down to the spear switcharoo, and Kaworu had to abort the Impact because it was now not the perfect scenario Seele envisioned; the result we got is Gendo's muck-up of Fourth Impact and Seele's early suicide. Kaworu was telling Shinji to stop because the plan was no longer going his way.

Also, I do not think Kaworu was maliciously manipulating Shinji; my insert at the end about him being evil was a joke. I do think Kaworu had Shinji's happiness in mind, however he never was never completely honest or forthright about his goals. He would spoon feed him a bit of info here and there, half-truths and what-nots, and then a little bit of feel-good pep talk about changing the world and atoning for sins. Kaworu manipulated Shinji by opening doors and tempting him to follow , and Shinji took it like bait because Kaworu was the only person showing him positive attention. That positive attention, however, was always intended to get Shinji in the Eva, and it was always intended to get Shinji to pull the spears with him (assuming they were the correct spears).

Kaworu's own ideas about Shinji's happiness may be biased, just as anybody deeply involved in their religion would be when sharing their religion with another (particularly when sharing with the intent of conversion). For example, a Christian might have interest in getting a friend to also be a Christian in order to save them from eternal hellfire; the intent may be good, but ultimately it is biased. Kaworu's idea of Shinji's happiness may have been the promised land that Seele envisioned with Human Instrumentality. Instead, Kaworu had his plans thwarted, became an hero, and Shinji was left behind in bitter reality.

So. . . can we expect to get some idea of what Kaworu was planning to do with Fourth Impact in Final/4.0? Or is Anno going to leave that ambiguous like 'who killed Kaji' in the original series?

Sachi wrote:I agree with ElMariachi that the difference between Gendo and Seele's vision came down to the spear switcharoo, and Kaworu had to abort the Impact because it was now not the perfect scenario Seele envisioned;

It was the scenario SEELE envisioned, or at least the events still were compatible with their scenario.
Fuyu said after Fourth Impact was stopped that nearly everything had gone as SEELE wanted, meaning that had Kaworu and Mari failed to stop EVA-13, SEELE would had won.
It's just that since there's also a LoC down there, that also goes well with Kaworu's current plan to bring Shinji happiness, so both their scenario coincided... until the LoC was revealed to have morphed into a LoL, throwing Kaworu's plan in the gutter.

Nice theory! It's been a whole new movie and we still haven't gotten any direct answers to this. I have a question though: Why did Kaworu put on the DSS choker?

ElMariachi wrote:after so many years he will finally be able to bring Shinji his happiness! But... what the hell?! Why is Shinji's state even worse than two days go?! He was supposed to get slightly better, to absorb the shock of what he saw! What? He didn't saved Ayanami? Gendo, your bastard, Shinji didn't needed to know that! But there is no time to go to complain to him, or even to let Shinji time to cool off : the promised time is here, and WILLE could lose its patience and launch an offensive at any moment! He must convince Shinji to come with him, to trust him, no matter how, it's for Shinji-kun's sake! So with desperate times come desperate measure : Kaworu decide to put directly his life on the line and take off the DSS Choker from Shinji to put it on him, effectively snapping Shinji out of his BSOD... and unknowingly closing the maws of Gendo's trap around him and Shinji!

It's entirely possible that Kaworu put on the DSS choker in a desperate attempt to get Shinji to trust him. However, the DSS choker is used to prevent impacts and activates upon the awakening of an Evangelion. You mentioned that SEELE's (and Kaworu's if we go off your theory) version of Instrumentality requires an awakened Evangelion as well as an Impact.

Kaworu had obviously expected his version of Instrumentality to go through, which would guarantee his death by the choker due to the resulting Impact. So why did he still put it on? If it had gone his way and there were spears of different types, would he just have taken it off before the Evangelion awoke? What was he thinking?

I'm sorry for reopening a ten-year-old thread...

Leap wrote:Nice theory! It's been a whole new movie and we still haven't gotten any direct answers to this. I have a question though: Why did Kaworu put on the DSS choker?

We could already know this theory is wrong due to 3.0+1.0.
Kaworu wasn't following SEELE's plan.

SEELE's plan in 3.0 is the Fourth Impact "purifying" the souls to complete the human evolution into beings with Fruit of Life but without Fruit of Knowledge (this is mentioned by Gendo in 3.0+1.0). Honestly, following the dialogue on 3.0, you can tell the Fourth Impact in 3.0 follows SEELE's design, since Fuyutsuki mentioned that SEELE's goal was almost achieved (Gendo was lucky that Mari could expulse Shinji from Eva-13 to stop the Fourth Impact).

Instead, it's pretty clear that Kaworu didn't want the Fourth Impact in 3.0, he even expected his death or Eva-13 being impaled would close the Gates of Guf and stop the Fourth Impact. This failed because Shinji worked as SEELE's back-up (Mari mentioned it).

Kaworu's goal with the Spears and Eva-13 was what he said to Shinji: Repair the world so the humans could survive (in 3.0+1.0, we confirm the humans lives in a pretty precarious situation). This will also give hope and redemption to Shinji, which is likely the happiness he wanted for Shinji.

Leap wrote:Kaworu had obviously expected his version of Instrumentality to go through, which would guarantee his death by the choker due to the resulting Impact. So why did he still put it on? If it had gone his way and there were spears of different types, would he just have taken it off before the Evangelion awoke? What was he thinking?

Kaworu likely never expected to survive the mission to repair the world. In 3.0+1.0, we could see the person who repair the World will likely need to sacrifice himself (as Shinji almost did). So, the DSS Choker killing him wouldn't be a real concern.

Kaworu mentioned he always planned to take the DSS Choker from Shinji, so maybe Kaworu did it at that moment to make Shinji feel safer, but he always planned to take that dangerous object away from Shinji.


PS: In 3.0+1.0, we even discover Kaworu seems to have had a friendship with Kaji, so Kaworu seems to have always been on humanity side and against SEELE/NERV.

All discussion of Kaworus reasoning for putting the choker on must acknowledge that the DSS choker is a metaphor for burden and responsability, and Kaworu putting it on is a display of how his care for Shinji is self destructive. This parallel is further used when Shinji puts it on when going to the Anti-Universe, him accepting the consequence of his actions in order to atone, and when Mari takes it off in the end of Shin, symbolizing Shinjis character arcs conclusion.

With that in mind, my way of understanding the scene as anything other than symbolism at the cost of plot consistency is that Kaworu didnt expect it to activate, he just wanted to take it off from Shinji to get his trust, stop his fears of being popped, etc etc. The choker only started detonating once Kaworu became the 13th angel, something he did not expect nor want to happen.

I assume his plan was to reach the Golgotha object, shown in the middle of the sky rings unit 13 was ascending towards in Q, and then do the mutual spear exhaust Gendo did in Shin to rewrite the world. Longinus represents despair and Cassius hope, two perfect opposed forces that cause each other (sacrifice and trigger) and balance out, how it somehow allows for instrumentality I dont yet know, but I assume an exhaust of two Longinus spears, despair causing despair, would be pretty bad.

LucAAAs wrote:I assume his plan was to reach the Golgotha object, shown in the middle of the sky rings unit 13 was ascending towards in Q, and then do the mutual spear exhaust Gendo did in Shin to rewrite the world. Longinus represents despair and Cassius hope, two perfect opposed forces that cause each other (sacrifice and trigger) and balance out, how it somehow allows for instrumentality I dont yet know, but I assume an exhaust of two Longinus spears, despair causing despair, would be pretty bad.

It's possible Kaworu planned to reach the Golgotha Object with Eva-13 and the Spears of Longinus and Cassius. In 3.0+1.0, we see Shinji could repair the World in that place (he also needs the Spear of Gaius).

Now, the two Spears of Longinus being consumed by the Gates of Guf in 3.0 would have caused exactly the same event that the Black Moon Spear being consumed by the Gates of Guf in 3.0+1.0 caused. I mean, the "purification" of the souls.

Gendo mentioned SEELE's Instrumentality would be completed with the "purification" of souls, that's why Fuyutsuki mentioned SEELE's plan was almost achieved in 3.0. Instead, Gendo's Instrumentality also needs the "purification" of souls, but his plan will continue with the Additional Impact (that's why he needs the Black Moon Spear to preserve the other Spears).


PS: Kaworu's plan to repair the World didn't need the "purification" of souls. So, in his plan, Eva-13 should go directly to the Golghota object after it retrieves the Spears of Cassius and Longinus.