[Speculation] a new take on the 'Failures of Infinity'

[Jurrasic]

Thank you to El Mariachi for the post in the translation thread where he examines the subtitles of the French version of 3.0 compared to the English GitHub translation. In it he makes a most interesting speculation on the explanation of the 'Failures of Infinity:

So could it be that the FoIs were born inside Lilith's Chamber and tried to climb all the way up through the Main Shaft to fuse with he core-ified landscape and make it become something else? Maybe they are the origin of the giant teeth canyon and blue iris?

This set off a chain reaction of fan-wankery in my head. I don't think they came from Lilith's chamber, but the following theory strikes me as a most awesome and even plausible scenario:

"Infinity" as a state of being, all humanity in complete union with Mother Earth as a world-sized sentient being. For SEELE, the Instrumentality project was their plan to hasten this 'end of the world' scenario and make the end result most favourable for them.

The first part of the world-forming began with 3rd Impact that happened in the timeskip. The first requirement of Instrumentality was the conversion of all living things to a type that is capable of being transformed into core material: an Evangelion/Angel body. This happened. The 'coreified' millions in Japan began to move towards/merge with Lilith. Those who touched her became one with the growing Red Earth, who was beginning to grow a head with face as it's intended final form: a world-sized sentient being, a throne of all souls, a living sentient ark of all humanity as One.

Eyes and mouth began to form first, but while all this was going on, there was a frantic battle to stop the process, which ended abruptly when Lilith was killed, beheaded and eviscerated. Even then the coreified humans attempted to reach and merge with Lilith and the Earth until their lifeforce ran out and they died, failing to become part of Infinity, the final single life-form.

So this lifeform was now stillborn, the process stopped at the face level. Presumably all of Japan would have made up the head and the rest of the world, as the Core-ification (heralded by the sea of crosses) spread across it, would have made up the rest of the body.

There are other aspects of this that could be examined, such as the reason why the Black moon has to come out which also began in this 3rd Impact but stopped as well (which is why Nerv HQ is suddenly up in the sky) but clearly the process was beginning again as we saw the Black Moon emerged fully, but I wonder if the dead FOIs can be re-used to continue that part of the process? They were just rag dolling around in the wind of 4th impact. I understand some feel they were still alive and making an eerie sound, but I am not sure this was them.

That, or they are alive again, and Gendo plans to armour them all with the MP Eva gear his is producing, and thus prevent them from being absorbed. This makes up the gigantic army we see in the end of movie preview for Final.

Of course there is no way that this can be proven without further clarification from Khara or the (hopefully upcoming) CRC of 3.0 but anyway, food for thought? or am I way out to lunch?

[Charsi]

I agree, and i've speculated on this elsewhere (but I can't find the post). I think it might be in the black moon thread.

Speculation there (by others) suggests that the Black Moon screw-like thing unearthed at the end of 3.33 bears some resemblance to an entry plug - for the planet. In other words the Earth is an Eva (and/or was becoming one) and 3.33's Impact ejected the entry plug.

[Shinoyami65]

My theory is that the FoIs weren't trying to combine with the Earth, but with each other. We see several FoIs seem to have started merging into larger FoIs, such as in certain images in the FoI thread- possibly the ultimate goal of this was for all the FoIs to merge into once enormous Evangelion, an ultimate lifeform composed of all the life on Earth.

[Th3Marauder]

In EoE Shinji was the godhead of Third Impact, and he wanted everyone to die, and so that's what happened. Everyone got tanged as part of Instrumentality. In Rebuild, Yui/Unit-01 was the godhead of Third Impact, and thus all people were remade in her image. That's how I've always seen it.

[Sailor Star Dust]

Wasn't it stated in another thread that the FoI look more like Mark.06 than Eva-01?

[ElMariachi]

Nope, that was the contrary : the FoIs are copies of EVA-01, not Mark.06.(they have EVA-01's distinctive chest plate)

[Th3Marauder]

Unlike the new MPE during the preview, which I believe are Mk. 06 copies.

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

The FoI's in the main shaft and command center are Eva-01 copies. The ones outside are haute couture.

[ElMariachi]

As for my theory that the FoIs are the origin of the teeth canyon, giant blue "iris" and giant red crosses, it comes from diverse observations :
1/ the FoIs are all crawling upward from Lilith's chamber, we didn't saw a single FoI going downward.
2/ all the FoIs are headless, and a sea of EVA-sized skulls are littering Lilith's Chamber, how would these skulls ended in the Chamber if they were born in the Tokyo-3 landscape above?
3/ Lilith's corpse is atop the sea of skulls, meaning that the FoIs lost their head before Lilith was killed
4/ we saw FoIs being agglutinated around Lilith's head, but not her corpse? Besides all of the FoIs in her chamber are climbing the wall, like not one of them had any business to do with Lilith's corpse.
5/ Where did the lake of LCL go?

So putting aside Mark.06, the JSSDF and the 12th Angel, since we don't know who did what, that's my theory :

Lilith awoke(as a response to Shinji's N3I? Latter because of the 12th Angel? Of SEELE who tried to resurrect her before time? Who knows), and since her head in the Command Center was much bigger that what we saw of her when she was still crucified, that means that Lilith still had her head when she increased her size : a possibility is that she absorbed part of the lake of LCL around her to get bigger(maybe to get more powerful?), she generates LCL, so it's not that far of a stretch to think that she can absorb it back for herself.

But then she has been beheaded for some reason(Mark.06, the JSSDF, the 12th Angel's doing, whatever), and as a response(from Lilith?) the FoIs where summoned from the rests of the lake of LCL : said LCL took EVA-01's image(because she was made from Lilith? Because Rei's soul was inside and was Lilith's soul? Both?), but as a response to Lilith's corpse headlessness, all the FoIs lose their head as soon as born, with the thousands of FoIs that Lilith summoned, soon their skulls littered the ground, helped with the LCL lake slowly drying to create new FoIs.

Then all of these FoIs started to climb up the Main Shaft to reach the surface, some of them bifurcating to recuperate Lilith's head(maybe they wanted to give it back to her), and once they reached the surface, they started to dissolve(or phase through) to fuse with the ground, turning the place around into core material as a side-effect, the combined efforts of thousands upon thousands of FoIs "conquering" more and more land, all merging into a single giant core advancing little by little with each FoI fusing with it, all being reunited into a single godly being transcending everything the world has ever seen, a godly hive mind being dubbed "Infinity". Think about what happen when you slowly spills the content of a glass of water to the ground : the more water you spill, and the farther it spreads in all direction, well that was the same thing with the FoI fusing with the ground.

After some time and numerous enough FoIs fused, "Infinity" began to form physical traits, like a mouth and an eye, but then Mark.06 managed to infiltrate Lilith's Chamber and spears her(and himself in the process) putting a stop to the process and "killing" the FoIs. And the one we saw merging into some sort of giant "tower"? Maybe they were forming the giant red crosses we saw around the Geofront, these crosses must come from somewhere(or something in that case), maybe these crosses served as "relays" to spread further the core-erosion of the ground, and with it "Infinity".

Now the last question is why the FoIs are made from core material while the skull are made of bones? Well maybe the FoIs weren't always made of core. Maybe while active they were organic beings who took the form of EVA-01, armor plate and shoulder pylons included, but made of flesh instead of metal(maybe they were even completely white, like Lilith!), and when Lilith was speared and thus killed, the still actives FoIs were petrified into core material.

That would explain why some of them where looking like merging with buildings : they were petrified while dissolving into "Infinity". That would also explain why the buildings were so well conserved : 1.0 and 2.0 showed us that an Evangelion running around in a city wrecked a big havoc, and there were only three of them maximum at a same time... and here we had thousands of EVA-sized beings, yet not a single building, not a single house has been trampled! Well If the FoIs dissolved(or phased) in the ground that would explain both the perfect state of conservation of the city, and why some of them appears to be fused with the buildings.

And getting that theory even farther, maybe the "line" of giant white crosses we saw in the horizon in 3.0 while the Wunder was leaving the ruins of Tokyo-3 was a counter-measure from mankind to stop the spreading of "Infinity".

The big grip with that theory is the fact that the whole planet has turned blood-red during the time skip, as seen during Operation US? that would imply that the whole planet as been turned into core. But that seems impossible, since WILLE's supplies must have come from somewhere, all that metal to outfit the Wunder, get a new armor type for the Evangelions, make maintenance and reparations for them and the fleet, all of this must have been extracted and forged somewhere.
And their food must have been grown in a fertile soil, even if it's tasteless nutrient goo like what Shinji ate while at neo-NERV : if even then managed to get food and weren't reduced to nutrient pills like Rei, why would the survivors outside share worst?

As for the red Earth, maybe that was a trickery of the light made by some LCL mixed with the atmosphere, making us see Earth as a completely red dead rock, while actually the situation is a little better.

[Stillborn]

I'm sleepy so I may overlooked it was discussed already...

Lilith's headless corpse rests on pile of skulls while her head, rests atop headless FoI

As if they exchanged heads or tried to complete each other.

Both Lilith's pieces in two different places are acompanied by the opposite piece of FoI

Is there some analogy or symbolism in that or am I just seeing things or missed that topic?

[Jurrasic]

I'm sleepy so I may overlooked it was discussed already...

Lilith's headless corpse rests on pile of skulls while her head, rests atop headless FoI

As if they exchanged heads or tried to complete each other.

Both Lilith's pieces in two different places are acompanied by the opposite piece of FoI

Is there some analogy or symbolism in that or am I just seeing things or missed that topic?

Yeah, this is kind of where it breaks down for me, I still can't see a good reason why there are thousands upon thousands of eva-sized but human-shaped skulls down in Lilith's chamber. I suppose they may well have come from the lifeforms that merged into Infinity, their body material absorbed but the bone of the head -alone- remains, and drops to the pit. But if so, why?

This is one of the puzzling bits that I would REALLY like to see answered somewhere in the future.

[ElMariachi]

That can't be, since even the FoIs that didn't merged with Infinity yet were beheaded.
That's why I think that their head fell from the moment they were born, as a reaction to Lilith's body being beheaded perhaps, and that would imply that they were born in Lilith's chamber, and not in the landscape above.

[wiser3754]

Anyone pointed out that when the Cassius spear impaled Unit 01, it took/absorbed it's DNA into itself basically acting as a syringe or bloodied knife?
Imagine if that were the case and you used it to impale Lilith, you might be injecting Unit 01 into her, causing the FOI to be created and Lilith to awaken.
Remember what Kaworu said, Shinji going to save Rei and essentially awakening EVA-01 in the process acted as the catalyst for the events leading up to 3rd Impact actual, so I wouldn't be surprised NERV/SEELE took a piece of that Catalyst and used it on Lilith.

I also wouldn't be surprised that EVA-01 face is now that of Rei, but as of right now, we don't know.

This is my take and not a very thought out one, so feel free to add, destroy, dismiss, contradict blah, blah, blah you know how forums are.

[ElMariachi]

But if your theory is true, if the LoC took a piece of EVA-01 and was later used on Lilith, then why Lilith had Rei's face? Why not Yui's or even Shinji's?
Unless Rei has Lilith's soul like in NGE, I don't see why it should be her face that Lilith chose.

[wiser3754]

But if your theory is true, if the LoC took a piece of EVA-01 and was later used on Lilith, then why Lilith had Rei's face? Why not Yui's or even Shinji's?
Unless Rei has Lilith's soul like in NGE, I don't see why it should be her face that Lilith chose.

Notice that Gendo states to the Ayanami head that "We'll soon be together, Yui", is he referencing the head to Yui or just for simple exposition of his intentions?
Also remember, Unit 01 is dominantly more female than male and to also point out that Shinji and Rei don't look really all that dissimilar, so perhaps it's an amalgamation of the two (or three), just like the Iris cavern, put Red (Rer's eye color) and blue (Shinji's eye color) together and you get purple.

[ElMariachi]

Gendo was just exposing his intentions, the script said it clearly that the giant head is a "Rei head", for further confirmation, look at the bangs in the forehead : Yui as parting bangs, whereas Rei's are crossing in front of her forehead.

The giant head has the bangs crossing in front of its forehead, it's at Rei's image.

[wiser3754]

Alright, how about this theory/hypothesis. Kaworu intentionally spears EVA-01, contaminating the LOC, so when the time came to use Mark.06 and the LOC to complete the Covenant of Lilith (Spear of Longinus removed by this point, it's was in her back while she was on her knees after awakening) it would backfire, causing the FOI and other Third Impact after effects.

Kaworu wanted to meet Shinji, he had to have found a way to throw a wrench in the clockwork of NERV/SEELE's plans somehow in order to meet that goal, and I don't see how NERV/SEELE succeeding while he was trapped in EVA-01 would he meet that goal.

I'm really scraping the bottom of the barrel here, I'm ready to throw in the towel and just admit, EVA-01 did it, no way around it.

[ElMariachi]

Wow! That would paint Kaworu on a very different light, as completely crazy obsessed as Gendo!

Still I really doubt that he intentionally speared EVA-01 : by the look of it when he was getting ready to sortie with mark.06 it was to kill Zeruel, but since against all odds Shinji managed to destroy it and started N3I as a side effect, he had to use his LoC to stop N3I instead.
But it's still possible that he threw a wrench in SEELE's plan when it was clear that they didn't intended to use EVA-01, nor to try to get Shinji out of it. Maybe his wrench had more catastrophic results than what he imagined, leading to this blood-red world.
But then that would really makes him the biggest dick of the franchise, since he would be the one who destroyed the world, yet told to Shinji that he was the one who did it, not really something to do you want his happiness!(unless he has the same twisted "the end justify the means" as Gendo and SEELE and though that this immense immediate pain and despair was a little price for the eternal happiness that will come alter...)

But any way EVA-01 had a part in it : the FoI are all in her image, so whether it was directly(resumed N3I when the spear was pulled out?) or indirectly(used as a catalyst for HIP that turned wrong? Had a link with Lilith's corpse due to Rei's soul and/or EVA-01 made from Lilith, explaining the giant Rei head and the FoI?), she must had a part in it, now the question remains as to if it was a big or a small part.

But in any case, whatever happened involved EVA-01, not Shinji : from the moment he took Rei in his arms to when he awoke in the AAA Wunde(or maybe a little before when he saved Asuka in space), he was completely unconscious and out of the equation, at least until we learn other elements.

[wiser3754]

But any way EVA-01 had a part in it : the FoI are all in her image, so whether it was directly(resumed N3I when the spear was pulled out?) or indirectly(used as a catalyst for HIP that turned wrong? Had a link with Lilith's corpse due to Rei's soul and/or EVA-01 made from Lilith, explaining the giant Rei head and the FoI?), she must had a part in it, now the question remains as to if it was a big or a small part.

All I'm saying between the relationship of the LOC and EVA-01 is that when the LOC pierced her core, genetic, meme or DNA of her was imparted onto the LOC. Hence, when the LOC was used on Lilith for whatever reason, the imparted information of EVA-01 was passed onto Lilith, hence the FOI, but again, it's just too far fetched to be conclusive.

You ever get the notion that when Kaworu tells Shinji "Don't let it weigh on your mind" when they're going down the main shaft seeing the FOI on the walls that it's a message to the viewer from Anno "Don't let it weigh on your mind", as in, don't bother trying to figure it out.
To a physician or mathematician, the word "infinity" is another name for "failure", in an equation that equals infinity.

[Sherbert]

That can't be, since even the FoIs that didn't merged with Infinity yet were beheaded.
That's why I think that their head fell from the moment they were born, as a reaction to Lilith's body being beheaded perhaps, and that would imply that they were born in Lilith's chamber, and not in the landscape above.

I had a theory that the Mark 9 went around beheading the FoI's with that scythe it used to decapitate the Mark 6, down in dogma. Maybe as to prevent them from "re-activating" in the future.